’I am going with him on this quest.  It sounds a little absurd, doesn’t it? my going in quest of the Christian river?  But if one thinks for a moment, one thing is as absurd as another.  Do you know, I find it difficult to take life seriously, and I walk about the streets thinking of you, Father Gogarty, and the smile that will come over your face, half angry, half pleased, when you read that your schoolmistress is going to Central Asia in quest of the Christian river.  What will you be doing all this time?  You say that you cannot leave your parish because you fear to give scandal; you fear to pain the poor people, who have been good to you and who have given you money, and your scruple is a noble one; I appreciate and respect it.  But we must not think entirely of our duties to others; we must think of our duties to ourselves.  Each one must try to realize himself—­I mean that we must try to bring the gifts that Nature gave us to fruition.  Nature has given you many gifts:  I wonder what will become of you?

’Very sincerely yours,

‘NORA GLYNN.’

‘Good God, how I love that woman!’ the priest said, awaking from his reverie, for the clock told him that he had sat for nearly three-quarters of an hour, her letter in his hand, after having read it.  And lying back in his armchair, his hands clasped, his eyes fixed on the window, listening to the birds singing in the vine—­it was already in leaf, and the shadows of the leaves danced across the carpet—­he sought to define that sense of delight—­he could find no other words for it—­which she exhaled unconsciously as a flower exhales its perfume, that joy of life which she scattered with as little premeditation as the birds scattered their songs.  But though he was constantly seeking some new form of expression of her charm, he always came back to the words ‘sense of delight.’  Sometimes he added that sense of delight which we experience when we go out of the house on an April morning and find everything growing about us, the sky wilful and blue, and the clouds going by, saying, ‘Be happy, as we are.’

She was so different from every other woman.  All other women were plain instincts, come into the world for the accomplishment of things that women had accomplished for thousands of years.  Other women think as their mothers thought, and as their daughters will think, expressing the thoughts of the countless generations behind and in front of them.  But this woman was moved merely by impulses; and what is more inexplicable than an impulse?  What is the spring but an impulse? and this woman was mysterious, evanescent as its breath, with the same irresponsible seduction.  He was certain that she was at last clear to him, though she might become dark to him again.  One day she had come to gather flowers, and while arranging her posy she said casually:  ’You are a ruler in this parish; you direct it, the administration of the parish is your business, and I am the little amusement that you turn to when your business is done.’  He had not known how to answer her.  In this way her remarks often covered him with confusion.  She just thought as she pleased, and spoke as she pleased, and he returned to his idea that she was more like the primitive woman than anybody else.