flower-garden showing from the high road, its little stable for the
pony and little paddock for the cow. He loved his large smooth-faced
second wife, with her large balance at the bank and still larger
credit in the Wesleyan circle they lived and moved in. He loved that
Wesleyan circle, the comfortable, safe community that knew only the
best, the Sunday best, of him. And Keith loved none of these things.
By the education he had got and which he, Isaac, had given him, by the
"religion" he hadn't got, and which nothing would induce him to take,
by the obscure barriers of individuality and temperament, the son was
separated from the father. As for meeting each other half-way, Isaac
had tried it once or twice of a Sunday, when Keith had met him indeed,
but with a directness that shocked Isaac and distressed him. He was
made positively uncomfortable by his son's money-bought superiority;
though the boy didn't bring it out and show it, Isaac felt all the
time that it was there. He was very much happier without the boy.
Keith among other things suggested vividly the thoughts which the
Wesleyan desired to put away from Saturday afternoon to Monday
morning, thoughts of the present evil world, for which, on Sundays, he
more than half suspected that he might be imperilling his immortal
soul.

Sometimes in the watches of the night, especially of a Sunday night,
it occurred to him that (owing to the domestic arrangement which kept
the boy in a place which, when all was said and done, was a place of
temptation) Keith's soul, no less immortal, might be in jeopardy too.
He thought of him, an innocent lad, thrown on the mercy of London, as
it were. But Isaac had faith in the mercy of the Lord. Besides, he
wasn't the sort, a quiet, studious young fellow like Keith wasn't. And
when Isaac's conscience began to feel a little uncertain upon that
point, he simply laid the case circumstantially before the Lord, who