was dressed in grey that was nevertheless not grey but had an effect of colour, and there was a thread of black along the lines of her body and a gleam of gold.  She carried her head back with less dignity than pride; there was a little frozen movement in her dark hair as if it flamed up out of her head.  There were silver ornaments in her hair.  She spoke with a pretty little weakness of the r’s that had probably been acquired abroad.  And she lost no time in telling him, she was eager to tell him, that she had been waylaying him.  “I did so want to talk to you some maw,” she said.  “I was shy last night and they we’ all so noisy and eaga’.  I p’ayed that you might come down early.

“It’s an oppo’tunity I’ve longed for,” she said.

She did her very pretty best to convey what it was had been troubling her. ’iligion bad been worrying her for years.  Life was—­oh—­just ornaments and games and so wea’isome, so wea’isome, unless it was ’iligious.  And she couldn’t get it ’iligious.

The bishop nodded his head gravely.

“You unde’stand?” she pressed.

“I understand too well—­the attempt to get hold—­and keep hold.”

“I knew you would!” she cried.

She went on with an impulsive rapidity.  O’thodoxy had always ’ipelled her,—­always.  She had felt herself confronted by the most insurmountable difficulties, and yet whenever she had gone away from Christianity—­she had gone away from Christianity, to the Theosophists and the Christian Scientists—­she had felt she was only “st’aying fu’tha.”  And then suddenly when he was speaking last night, she had felt he knew.  It was so wonderful to hear the “k’eed was only a symbol.”

“Symbol is the proper name for it,” said the bishop.  “It wasn’t for centuries it was called the Creed.”

Yes, and so what it really meant was something quite different from what it did mean.

The bishop felt that this sentence also was only a symbol, and nodded encouragingly—­but gravely, warily.

And there she was, and the point was there were thousands and thousands and thousands of educated people like her who were dying to get through these old-fashioned symbols to the true faith that lay behind them.  That they knew lay behind them.  She didn’t know if he had read “The Light under the Altar”?

“He’s vicar of Wombash—­in my diocese,” said the bishop with restraint.

“It’s wonde’ful stuff,” said Lady Sunderbund.  “It’s spi’tually cold, but it’s intellectually wonde’ful.  But we want that with spi’tuality.  We want it so badly.  If some one—­”

She became daring.  She bit her under lip and flashed her spirit at him.

“If you—­” she said and paused.

“Could think aloud,” said the bishop.

“Yes,” she said, nodding rapidly, and became breathless to hear.

It would certainly be an astonishing end to the Chasters difficulty if the bishop went over to the heretic, the bishop reflected.