rk-a-day world--not very far,
but still far enough to know how she would feel if Bent or Mrs. Bent
surprised her in Jervis's arms. A few moments ago she would hardly have
cared.

"Let's go into the Cathedral now," she said, and, to break the cruelty
of her silent refusal of what he asked, she held out her hand. To her
surprise, and yes, her disappointment, he did not seem to see it.
Instead, he stepped forward to the door, and turning the weighty iron
handle, pushed it widely open.

Together, side by side, they passed through into the great, still,
peaceful place, and with a delicious feeling of joy they saw that they
were alone--that Mrs. Bent, having done her duty in unbolting the great
door, had slipt out of a side door, and gone back to her cottage, behind
the Cathedral.

Rose led the way into the nave; there she knelt down, and Jervis Blake
knelt down by her, and this time, when she put out her hand, he took it
in his and clasped it closely.

Rose tried to collect her thoughts. She even tried to pray. But she
could only feel,--she could not utter the supplications which filled her
troubled heart. And yet she felt as though they two were encompassed by
holy presences, by happy spirits, who understood and sympathised in her
mingled joy and grief.

If Jervis came back, if he and she both lived till the end of the War,
it was here that their marriage would take place. But the girl had a
strange presentiment that they two would never stand over there, where
so many brides and bridegrooms had stood together, even within her short
memory. It was not that she felt Jervis was going to be killed--she was
mercifully spared those dread imaginings which were to come on her
later. But just now, for these few moments only perhaps, Rose Otway was
"fey"; she seemed to know that to-day was her cathedral marriage day,
and that an invisible choir was singing her epithalamium.

The quarter past the hour chimed. She released her hand from his, and
touched him on the arm with a lingering, caressing touch. He was so big
and strong, so gentle too--all hers. And now, just as they had found one
another, she was going to lose him. It seemed so unnatural and so cruel.
"Jervis," she whispered, and the tears ran down her face, "I think you
had better go now. I'd rather we said good-bye here."

He got up at once. "Do you mean to tell your mother?" he asked. And
then, as he thought she was hesitating: "I only want to know because, if
so,