ecilia on the distant wall, wondering at its childishness. How deep a
meaning she could give it now, and how religious a feeling!

She was not conscious of rustling silks or waving feathers; she hardly
saw the swarm of fashionable people about her; it seemed to her that her
old life had vanished as though she were dead; her soul might have taken
shelter in the body of some gray linnet for all that she thought or
cared about the vanities of human society. She wanted only to be loved
and to love, without being thought of, or noticed; to nestle in her own
corner, and let the world go by.

Unluckily the world would not go by. This world which she wanted to keep
at arms' length, was at church once for all, and meant to stay there; it
felt itself at home, and she, with her exclusive griefs and joys, was
the stranger. So long as the music lasted, all was sympathetic enough,
but when Mr. Hazard read the service, he seemed far-off and strange. He
belonged not to her but to the world; a thousand people had rights of
property in him, soul and body, and called their claim religion. What
had she to do with it? Parts of the service jarred on her ear. She began
to take a bitter pleasure in thinking that she had nothing, not even
religious ideas, in common with these people who came between her and
her lover. Her fatigue steadily worked on her nerves. By the time the
creed was read, she could not honestly feel that she believed a word of
it, or could force herself to say that she ever should believe it.

With fading self-confidence she listened to the sermon. It was
beautiful, simple, full of feeling and even of passion, but she felt
that it was made for her, and she shrank before the thousand people who
were thus let into the secret chambers of her heart. It treated of death
and its mystery, covering ignorance with a veil of religious hope, and
ending with an invocation of infinite love so intense in feeling and
expression that, beautiful as it was, Esther forgot its beauties in the
fear that the next word would reveal her to the world. This sort of
publicity was new to her, and threw her back on herself until religion
was forgotten in the alarm. She became more jealous than ever. What
business had these strangers with her love? Why should she share it with
them? When the service was over, she hurried Catherine away so quickly
that they were both at home before the church was fairly empty.

This was the end of her short happiness. S