The pressure on his shoulders increased a little.

“But you’re not afraid of anything, are you, Stonehouse?”

“No—­no, sir.  I don’t think so—­not really——­”

“I don’t think you are, either.  I liked the way you stood up to that poor faggot of hereditary superstitions and prejudices who was trying to frighten you into being as big a humbug as himself.  He’ll never get over it.  I daresay he’ll make things very unpleasant for you in his charming Christian way.  How old are you, Stonehouse?”

“Ten—­nearly, sir.”

“You’re big and precocious for your age.  You’ll get the better of him.  But if you’d been brought up with other children you’d have whined and cringed—­’Yes, sir,’ ’No, sir’—­and been a beastly canting hypocrite all your life.  You’re wonderfully lucky if you only knew it, Stonehouse.  You’re nearly ten, and you can’t read and you don’t say your prayers and your catechism and you know nothing about God Almighty.  You’ve a sporting chance of becoming a man——­”

Robert stumbled over his own feet.  A deeper, almost overpowering, tiredness had come over him.  And yet he was fascinated.  He had to try to understand.

“Isn’t there—­I mean—­isn’t there anyone like God?”

Mr. Ricardo stopped short.  He made a strange, wild gesture.  Standing there in the half-darkness he was more than ever like some poor hobbled bird trying desperately, furiously to beat its way back to freedom.

“Superstition—­superstition, Stonehouse—­the most crushing, damnable chain of all, the symbol of cowardice, of greed and vanity, the enemy of truth and knowledge, the hot-bed on which we breed the miserable half-men who cumber this earth, a pitiable myth——­”

He had almost shouted.  It was as though he had been addressing a vast audience.  His voice dropped now, and he walked on, peering about him anxiously.

“Well—­well, you are too young.  There are things you can’t understand.  But I shall teach you.  No, there is no God, Stonehouse.”

Robert was vaguely sorry.  It was true that he had no clear idea of God, and yet in some way He had been mixed up with the bands and music and marching crowds that were always just round the corner.  In his expansive, genial moments, so rare towards the end.  Dr. Stonehouse had been known to say, “God bless you, Christine,” and that had always meant a few hours’ peace.  It seemed very sad.

“What are you going to be, Stonehouse?”

“A doctor, sir.”

“Why?”

It was impossible to tell the whole truth—­namely, that because Francey had said she was to be a doctor he had said he would be one too, and a better one at that.  He gave half-measure.

“I want to be.”