, noticing that but mistaking the cause, said very
sympathetically: "During the Terror, a princess jogged along, smelling a
rose. Marriage is no worse than the guillotine, besides being much less
summary. Will you come?"

"Less summary? I should say so!" Cassy retorted. "It is far too
lingering."

But she followed him out into another hall, one that was hung with
tapestries. They were dim and embroidered with what seemed to be pearls.
On the floor was a rug, dim also, narrow, very long, that extended to a
room, lined with high-placed bookcases and set with low-placed lights.
In the room stood a man. He wore a long black coat and a waistcoat that
reached to his collar. In his hand was a book.

"Dr. Grantly," said Paliser, who added, "Miss Cara."

Dr. Grantly bowed but without distinction. Because of the position of
the lights, his face was obscured and what Cassy could discern of it she
judged young and uninteresting. When Paliser had first mentioned
him--and how long ago it seemed!--she had fancied him old. She had
fancied too that he would have little side whiskers. The fact that he
was young was not a disappointment. Clergymen, whether old or young, did
not interest her. She did not care for them, or for churches, or the
services in them. The ceremonial of worship seemed to her empty. Creeds
professed but not practised seemed to her vain. But she would carry an
injured cat for miles. A lost dog was found the moment she spotted it.
She did what good she could, not because it is a duty, but for a
superior reason. She liked to do it. One may be a Christian without
caring for churches.

"Dearly beloved----"

In the depths over which she had passed, excitement and the novelty of
it had, until then, supported her. But at that exordium, instantly, they
fell away; instantly fear, like a wave, swept over her. Instantly she
felt, and the feeling is by no means agreeable, that she was struggling
with the intangible in a void. But she had not intended to drown, or no,
that was not it, she had not wanted to marry. Aware of the depths, not
until then had she known their peril. Until that moment she had not
realised their menace. Then abruptly it caught and submerged her.

"I require and charge you both as ye will answer at the dreadful day of
judgment----"

The solemnity of the sonorous exhortation was water in her ears. The
sound of it reached her confusedly, in a jumble. She was drowning and it
was unconsciously, in thi