,
being also unaccustomed to commit herself....

Mondays were Blanca's "days," and Cecilia made her way towards the
studio. It was a large high room, full of people.

Motionless, by himself, close to the door, stood an old man, very thin
and rather bent, with silvery hair, and a thin silvery beard grasped in
his transparent fingers. He was dressed in a suit of smoke-grey cottage
tweed, which smelt of peat, and an Oxford shirt, whose collar, ceasing
prematurely, exposed a lean brown neck; his trousers, too, ended very
soon, and showed light socks. In his attitude there was something
suggestive of the patience and determination of a mule. At Cecilia's
approach he raised his eyes. It was at once apparent why, in so full a
room, he was standing alone. Those blue eyes looked as if he were about
to utter a prophetic statement.

"They have been speaking to me of an execution," he said.

Cecilia made a nervous movement.

"Yes, Father?"

"To take life," went on the old man in a voice which, though charged with
strong emotion, seemed to be speaking to itself, "was the chief mark of
the insensate barbarism still prevailing in those days. It sprang from
that most irreligious fetish, the belief in the permanence of the
individual ego after death. From the worship of that fetish had come all
the sorrows of the human race."

Cecilia, with an involuntary quiver of her little bag, said:

"Father, how can you?"

"They did not stop to love each other in this life; they were so sure
they had all eternity to do it in. The doctrine was an invention to
enable men to act like dogs with clear consciences. Love could never
come to full fruition till it was destroyed."

Cecilia looked hastily round; no one had heard. She moved a little
sideways, and became merged in another group. Her father's lips
continued moving. He had resumed the patient attitude which so slightly
suggested mules. A voice behind her said: "I do think your father is
such an interesting man, Mrs. Dallison."

Cecilia turned and saw a woman of middle height, with her hair done in
the early Italian fashion, and very small, dark, lively eyes, which
looked as though her love of living would keep her busy each minute of
her day and all the minutes that she could occupy of everybody else's
days.

"Mrs. Tallents Smallpeace? Oh! how do you do? I've been meaning to come
and see you for quite a long time, but I know you're always so busy."

With doubting e