he things she wanted, above all, to find out. Her cheeks went
hot, she clenched her hands and said resolutely:

"Mr. Cuthcott, do you believe in God?"

Mr. Cuthcott made a queer, deep little noise; it was not a laugh,
however, and it seemed as if he knew she could not bear him to look at
her just then.

"H'm!" he said. "Every one does that--according to their natures. Some
call God IT, some HIM, some HER, nowadays--that's all. You might as well
ask--do I believe that I'm alive?"

"Yes," said Nedda, "but which do YOU call God?"

As she asked that, he gave a wriggle, and it flashed through her: 'He
must think me an awful enfant terrible!' His face peered round at
her, queer and pale and puffy, with nice, straight eyes; and she added
hastily:

"It isn't a fair question, is it? Only you talked about darkness, and
the only way--so I thought--"

"Quite a fair question. My answer is, of course: 'All three'; but the
point is rather: Does one wish to make even an attempt to define God to
oneself? Frankly, I don't! I'm content to feel that there is in one some
kind of instinct toward perfection that one will still feel, I hope,
when the lights are going out; some kind of honour forbidding one to
let go and give up. That's all I've got; I really don't know that I want
more."

Nedda clasped her hands.

"I like that," she said; "only--what is perfection, Mr. Cuthcott?"

Again he emitted that deep little sound.

"Ah!" he repeated, "what is perfection? Awkward, that--isn't it?"

"Is it"--Nedda rushed the words out--"is it always to be sacrificing
yourself, or is it--is it always to be--to be expressing yourself?"

"To some--one; to some--the other; to some--half one, half the other."

"But which is it to me?"

"Ah! that you've got to find out for yourself. There's a sort of
metronome inside us--wonderful, sell-adjusting little machine; most
delicate bit of mechanism in the world--people call it conscience--that
records the proper beat of our tempos. I guess that's all we have to go
by."

Nedda said breathlessly:

"Yes; and it's frightfully hard, isn't it?"

"Exactly," Mr. Cuthcott answered. "That's why people devised religions
and other ways of having the thing done second-hand. We all object to
trouble and responsibility if we can possibly avoid it. Where do you
live?"

"In Hampstead."

"Your father must be a stand-by, isn't he?"

"Oh, yes; Dad's splendid; only, you see, I AM a good deal younger than
he.