e Mother, and walked on very
fast, for the bells of the Catholic Church were ringing for Benediction.

"Is it good-night, or may I come in?" Beauvayse whispered to Lynette in
the porch.

She dipped her slender fingers in the little holy-water font beside the
door, and held them out to him.

"Come in," she answered, and held white, wet fingers out to him. He
touched them with a puzzled smile.

"Am I to----? Ah, I remember!"

Their eyes met, and the golden radiance in hers passed into his blood. He
bared his high, fair head as she made the sign of the Cross, and followed
her in and up the nave as Father Wix, in purple Lenten stole over the
snowy cotta starched and ironed by Sister Tobias's capable hands, began to
intone the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary. The Sisters were already in
their places--a double row of black-draped figures, the Mother at the end
of the first row, Lady Hannah in the chair beside her, where Lynette had
always sat until now. It was not without a pang that the one saw her place
usurped by a stranger; it was piercing pain to the other to feel the
strange presence at her side. But something had already come between these
two, dividing them. Something invisible, impalpable as air, but
nevertheless thrusting them apart with a force that might not be resisted.

Only the elder of the two as yet knew clearly what it meant. The younger
was too dizzy with her first heady draught from the cup of joy, held to
her lips by the strong, beautifully-shaped brown hand that rested on
Beauvayse's knee as he sat, or propped up Beauvayse's chin as he knelt,
stiff as a young crusader on a monument, beside her. But the Mother knew.
Would not the God Who had been justly offended in her, His vowed servant,
that day, exact to the last tittle the penalty? She knew He would.

Rosary ended, the thin, kind-eyed little elderly priest preached, taking
for the text of his discourse the Introit from the Office of
Quinquagesima.

"_Esto mihi in Deum protectorum, et in locum refugii, ut salvum me
facias._"

"Be Thou unto me a God, a protector, and a place of refuge, to save me:
for Thou art my strength...."

Then the _O Salutaris_ was sung, and followed by the Litany of the Holy
Name.

The church was crowded. A Catholic congregation is always devout, but
these people, well-dressed or ill-dressed, prosperous or poor, pale-faced
and hollow-eyed every one, joined in the office with passion. The
responses came like the be