hood had left him; he was in a
turmoil of desire for an astounding experience. He almost asked himself
what he wanted so dearly; and, as he pondered, out of the past in a
vision came the picture of himself staring at the boy who walked beside
the incense with a silver boat. What did the Lay of St. Alois say?

_This with his chasuble, this with his rosary,_
_This with his incense-pot holding his nose awry._

Michael felt a craving to go somewhere and smell that powerful odour
again. He remembered how the boy had put out his tongue and he envied
him such familiarity with pomps and glories.

"Are there any High Churches in Bournemouth?" he asked Mrs. Rewins.
"Very high. Incense and all that, you know."

Mrs. Rewins informed him there was one church so high that some said it
was practically 'Roming Catholic.'

"Where is it?" asked Michael, choking with excitement. Yet he had never
before wanted to go to church. In the days of Nurse he had hated it. In
the days of Miss Carthew he had only found it endurable if his friends
were present. He had loathed the rustle of many women dressed in their
best clothes. He had hated the throaty voices of smooth-faced clergymen.
He had despised the sleek choir-boys smelling of yellow soap. Religion
had been compounded of Collects, Greek Testament, Offertory Bags,
varnish, qualms for the safety of one's top-hat, the pleasure of an
extra large hassock, ambition to be grown up and bend over instead of
kneeling down, the podgy feel of a Prayer Book, and a profound
disapproval that only Eton and Winchester among public schools were
mentioned in its diaphanous fumbling pages. Now religion should be an
adventure. The feeling that he was embarking upon the unknown made
Michael particularly reticent, and he was afraid to tell his mother that
on Sunday morning he proposed to attend the service at St.
Bartholomew's, lest she might suggest coming also. He did not want to be
irritated by Stella's affectations and conceit, nor did he wish to
notice various women turning round to study his mother's hat. In the end
Michael did not go on Sunday to the church of his intention, because at
the last moment he could not brace himself to mumble an excuse.

Late on the afternoon of the following day Michael walked through the
gustiness of a swift-closing summer toward St. Bartholomew's, where it
stood facing a stretch of sandy heather and twisted pine trees on the
outskirts of Bournemouth. The sky wa