“But there is no reason why I should weary you with an exact statement.”

“But you do not weary me, Monsignor; I am, on the contrary, deeply interested.”

“The convent owes a great deal to the late Reverend Mother, and the last thing I wish to express is disapproval.  We do not know the circumstances, and must not judge her; we know that she acted for the best.  No doubt she is now praying to God to secure the safety of her convent.”

Evelyn sat watching him, fascinated by the clear, peremptory, ecclesiastical dignity which he represented.  If he had a singing voice, she said to herself, it would be a tenor.  He had allowed the conversation to wander from the convent to the concert; and they were soon talking of their musical preferences.  There was an impersonal tenderness, a spiritual solicitude in his voice which enchained her; no single idea held her, but wave after wave of sensation passed, transforming and dissolving, changeable as a cloud.  Human life demands hope, and the priest is a symbol of hope; there is always a moment when the religionist doubts, and there is also a moment when the atheist says, “Who knows, perhaps.”  And this man had done what she had not been able to do:  he had put aside the paltry pleasures of the world, he placed his faith in things beyond the world, pleasures which perchance were not paltry.  An entirely sensual life was a terrible oppression; hers often weighed upon her like a nightmare; to be happy one must have an ideal and strive to live up to it.  Her mind flickered and sank, changing rapidly as an evening sky, never coming to anything distinct enough to be called a thought.  She desired to hear him speak, she felt that she must speak to him about religion; she wanted to know if he were sure, and how he had arrived at his certitudes....  She wanted to talk to him about life, death and immortality.  She had tried to lead the conversation into a religious discussion, but he seemed to avoid it, and just as she was about to put a definite question, Ulick came into the room.  He stood crushing his grey felt hat between his hands, a somewhat curious figure, and she watched him talking to Monsignor, thinking of the difference of vision.  As Ulick said, everything was in that.  Men were divided by the difference of their visions.  She was curious to know how the dogmatic and ritualistic vision of Monsignor affected Ulick, and when the prelate left she asked him.

He was as ingenuous and unexpected on this subject as he was on all subjects.  If the antique priest, he said, clothed himself in purple, it was to produce an exaltation in himself which would bring him closer to the idea, which would render him, as it were, accessible to it.  But the vestments of the modern priest had lost their original meaning, they were mere parade.  This explanation was very like Ulick; she smiled, and was interested, but her interest was passing and superficial.  The advent of the priest had moved her in the depths