bowed head, the murmured Latin formula sounded strangely familiar and delicious in her ears, with the more clearly enunciated “Ego te absolvo” towards the close.  In that supreme moment for which she had longed, the last traces of Owen’s agnostic teaching seemed to fall from her, and she was carried back to the days of her girlhood, to the days of her old prayer-book, a “Garden of the Soul” bound in ivory; and she rose from her knees, weak, but happy as a convalescent.

“I hope you will sleep well to-night,” said Monsignor, kindly, noticing the signs of physical exhaustion in Evelyn as she stood mechanically drawing down her veil and putting on her gloves.  “A good conscience is the best of all narcotics.”  Evelyn smiled through her tears, but could not trust herself to speak.  “But I don’t really like you living alone in Park Lane.  It is too great a strain on your nerves.  Could you not go to your father’s for a time?”

“Yes, perhaps, I don’t know.  Dear father would like to have me.”

He told her that the Mass he was to say to-morrow he would offer up for her; and as she drove home her joy grew more intense, and in a sort of spiritual intoxication she identified herself with the faith of her childhood.  Life again presented possibilities of infinite perfection, and she was astonished that the difficulties which she had thought insuperable had been so easily overcome.

All that evening she thought of God and his sacraments, and remembering the moment when his grace had descended upon her and all had become clear, she perforce believed in a miracle—­a miracle of grace had certainly happened.

She looked forward to the moment when her maid would leave the room, and she would throw herself on her knees and lose herself in prayer, as she had lost herself when she knelt beside Monsignor, and he absolved her from sin.  But when the door closed she was incapable of prayer, she only desired sleep.  Her whole mind seemed to have veered.  She had exaggerated everything, conducted herself strangely, hysterically, and her prayers were repeated without ardour, almost indifferently.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

But the next day she could not account to herself for the extraordinary relief she had derived from her confession.  For years she had battled with life alone, with no light to guide her, blown hither and thither by the gusts of her own emotions.  But now she was at peace, she was reconciled to the Church; she would never be alone again.  The struggle of her life still lay before her, and yet in a sense it was a thing of the past.  She felt like a ship that has passed from the roar of the surf into the shelter of the embaying land, and in the distance stretched the long peacefulness of the winding harbour.