that she felt in no way compelled to advise him of this,
her backsliding. I doubt whether such a perversion of her magnificent
course of action ever occurred to her. It was magnificent, for it
entailed a high disregarding stroke; it implied a sublime confidence of
what the end would be, a capacity to wait and endure. She smiled
buoyantly, in the intervals of arranging it, at the idea that Stephen
Arnold stood beyond her ultimate possession.

There were difficulties, but the moment was favourable to her, more
favourable than it would have been the year before, or any year but
this. Before ten days had passed she was able to write to Arnold
describing her plan, and she was put to it to keep the glow of success
out of her letter. She kept it out, that, and everything but a calm and
humble statement--any Clarke Brother might have dictated it--of what she
proposed to do. Perhaps the intention was less obvious than the desire
that he should approve it.

The messenger waited long by the entrance to the Mission House for an
answer, exchanging, sitting on his feet, the profane talk of the bazaar
with the gatekeeper of the Christians. Stephen was in chapel. There was
no service; he had half an hour to rest in and he rested there. He was
speculating, in the grateful dimness, about the dogma--he had never
quite accepted it, though Colquhoun had--of the intercessory power of
the souls of saints. A converted Brahmin, an old man, had died the day
before. Arnold luxuriated in the humility of thinking that he would be
glad of any good word dear old Nourendra Lal could say for him. The
chapel was deliciously refined. The scent of fresh-cut flowers floated
upon the continual presence of the incense; a lily outlined its head
against the tall carved altar-piece the Brothers had brought from
Damascus. The seven brass lamps that hung from the rafters above the
altar rails were also Damascene, carved and pierced so that the light in
them was a still thing like a prayer; and the place breathed vague
meanings which did not ask understanding. It was a refuge from the riot
and squalor of the whitewashed streets with a double value and a treble
charm, I. H. S. among plaster gods, a sanctuary in the bazaar. Stephen
sat in it motionless, with his lean limbs crossed in front of him, until
the half hour was up; then he bent his knee before the altar and went
out to meet a servant at the door with Hilda's letter. The chapel opened
upon an upper verand