Page 65 - Fairbrass

listening attentively to the service: he was
near to his own father (the stanchest of

Churchmen), apparently eagerly drinking

in the same words: he knew that one House
was rich and lonely, the other poor and
over-peopled ; and yet neither Beliefs, nor

Collects, nor Confessions, nor anything else

in the whole of the beautiful Liturgy,
seemed likely to heal the breach that lay
between them. Whenever the Parable of the

Prodigal Son was read, Fairbrass was on

the alert and expectant—not that he regarded
his father in the light of a prodigal, or for
one moment looked forward to a dinner of

roast veal, and whatever goes with it, at the
Large House on the side of the Hill ; but

thinking, in a general way, that something
ought to come out of the two listening to

that matchless story of filial disobedience
and parental forgiveness—more especially

as in this case there was no elder brother
and prosaically dutiful son to offer not

unreasonable objections to merrymaking
that seemed likely to lead to ill-considered