Molly had pride enough to shrink utterly from the connection with her mother, and her girl’s innocence shrank, too, with quick sensitiveness from what might be before her.  How strange now appeared the dreams of her childhood, the idealisation of the young and beautiful mother!

The letter was short, but very earnest, and had all the ring of truth in it.  She could not but think that any mother would respond to it, and, for herself, after sending it there could be no looking back.  Once the letter was posted to the lawyer to be forwarded to Madame Danterre, a huge weight seemed to be lifted from Molly’s mind.  That night she met Edmund Grosse at dinner.  He had never seen her so bright and good-looking, and he found he had many questions to ask as to the summer abroad.

For several weeks Molly received no answer from Florence, but during that time she did not repent her hasty action.  And during those weeks her interest in religion grew stronger.  Just as she had been unable to work with philanthropists, she was ready now to take her religion alone.  She felt kinder to the world at large, but she did not at first feel any need of human help or human company.  She went sometimes to a service at Westminster Abbey, sometimes to St. Paul’s, sometimes to the Oratory, and two or three times to the church in West Kensington in which Father Molyneux was assistant parish priest.  On the whole she liked this last much the best.  Indeed, she was so much attracted by his sermons that she went to call upon him late one afternoon.

The visitor was shown into a rather bare parlour, and Father Molyneux soon came in.  He was a good deal interested in seeing her there.  He had never been more snubbed in his life than by this lady on their first meeting, and he had been much surprised at seeing her in the church soon afterwards.  She was plainly dressed, though at an expense he would never have imagined to be possible, and she appeared a little softer than when he had seen her last.  She looked at him rather hard, not with the look that puzzled Rose Bright; it was a look of sympathy and of inquiry.

“I have had curious experiences since we met,” she said, “and I want to understand them better.  Have you—­has anybody been praying for me?”

“I have said Mass for you twice since poor Moloney died,” he said.

“I thought there was some sort of influence,” she murmured.  “That night I was tired and excited and worried, and foolishly prejudiced.  Somehow the prayers you read for Pat Moloney, the whole attitude of your Church in those prayers, caught my breath.  I imagine it was something like the effect of a revivalist preacher on a Welsh miner.”  She paused.  Father Molyneux was full of interest, and did not conceal it.

“I can’t tell,” he said.  “Of course, it may have been——­”

“Nerves,” interrupted Molly so decidedly that he laughed; it was not in the least what he had meant to say.