me at all," the girl
cried, and turned away; and then going forward suddenly as Evelyn was
about to leave the sacristy, she said:

"But when are you leaving? When are you leaving?"

"To-morrow; there is no reason why I should wait any longer."

"We cannot part like this." And she put down the chalice, and the
women went into a chill wind; the pear-trees were tossing, and there
were crocuses in the bed and a few snowdrops.

"You had better remain until the weather gets warmer; to leave in
this bleak season! Oh, Sister, how we shall miss you! But you were
never like a nun."

They walked many times to and fro, forgetful of the bleak wind
blowing.

"It must be so, you were never like a nun. Of course we all knew, I
at least knew... only we are sorry to lose you."

The next day a carriage came for Evelyn. The nuns assembled to bid
her goodbye; they were as kind as their ideas allowed them to be,
but, of course, they disapproved of Evelyn going, and the fifteen
hundred pounds she left them did not seem to reconcile them to her
departure. It certainly did not reconcile Mother Winifred, who
refused to come down to wish her goodbye, saying that Evelyn had
deceived them by promising to remain, or at all events led them to
think she would stay with them until the school was firmly
established. Mother Philippa apologised for her, but Evelyn said it
was not necessary.

"After all, what Mother Winifred says is the truth, only I could not
do otherwise. Now, goodbye, I'll come to see you again, may I not?"

They did not seem very anxious on this point, and Evelyn thought it
quite possible she might never see the convent again, which had meant
so much to her and which was now behind her. Her thoughts were
already engaged in the world towards which she was going, and
thinking of the etiolated hands of the nuns she remembered the brown
hands of her poor people; it was these hands that had drawn her out
of the convent, so she liked to think; and it was nearly the truth,
not the whole truth, for that we may never know.

XXXV

The blinds of 27, Berkeley Square were always down, and when Sir
Owen's friends called the answer was invariably the same: "No news of
Sir Owen yet; his letters aren't forwarded; business matters are
attended to by Mr. Watts, the secretary." And Sir Owen's friends went
away wondering when the wandering spirit would die in him.

It was these last travels, extending over two years, in the Far East,
t