A great sportsman he had been, with a famous breed of bull-terrier, and
anxious to revive the South Glebeshire Hunt; very fine, too, in that last
terrible year when the worst of all mortal diseases had leapt upon his
throat and shaken him with agony and the imminent prospect of death--
shaken him but never terrified him. Brandon summoned before him that
broad, jolly, laughing figure, summoned it, bowed to its fortitude and
optimism, then, as all men must, at such a moment, considered his own end;
then, having paid his due to Morrison, returned to the great business of
the--Living.
They were gathered together in the hall now. The Bishop had known Morrison
well and greatly liked him, and he could think of nothing but the man
himself. The question of the succession could not come near him that day,
and as he stood, a little white-haired figure, tottering on his stick in
the flagged hall, he seemed already to be far from the others, to be
caught already half-way along the road that Morrison was now travelling.
Both Brandon and Ronder felt that it was right for them to go, although on
a normal day they would have stayed walking in the garden and talking for
another three-quarters of an hour until it was time to catch the three-
thirty train from Carpledon.
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