There was an exclamation, then silence, as a tall, beautiful girl with flushed face and shining grey eyes came forward and stopped, followed by a man whom Percy knew at once from his pictures. A little whimpering sounded from the bed, and the priest lifted his hand instinctively to silence it. “Why,” said Mabel; and then stared at the man with the young face and the white hair. Oliver opened his lips and closed them again. He, too, had a strange excitement in his face. Then he spoke. “Who is this?” he said deliberately. “Oliver,” cried the girl, turning to him abruptly, “this is the priest I saw---” “A priest!” said the other, and came forward a step. “Why, I thought---” Percy drew a breath to steady that maddening vibration in his throat. “Yes, I am a priest,” he said. Again the whimpering broke out from the bed; and Percy, half turning again to silence it, saw the girl mechanically loosen the clasp of the thin dust cloak over her white dress. “You sent for him, mother?” snapped the man, with a tremble in his voice, and with a sudden jerk forward of his whole body. But the girl put out her hand. “Quietly, my dear,” she said. “Now, sir---” “Yes, I am a priest,” said Percy again, strung up now to a desperate resistance of will, hardly knowing what he said. “And you come to my house!” exclaimed the man. He came a step nearer, and half recoiled. “You swear you are a priest?” he said. “You have been here all this evening?” “Since midnight.” “And you are not---” he stopped again. Mabel stepped straight between them. “Oliver,” she said, still with that air of suppressed excitement, “we must not have a scene here. The poor dear is too ill. Will you come downstairs, sir?” Percy took a step towards the door, and Oliver moved slightly aside. Then the priest stopped, turned and lifted his hand. “God bless you!” he said simply, to the muttering figure in the bed. Then he went out, and waited outside the door. He could hear a low talking within; then a compassionate murmur from the girl’s voice; then Oliver was beside him, trembling all over, as white as ashes, and made a silent gesture as he went past him down the stairs. * * * * * The whole thing seemed to Percy like some incredible dream; it was all so unexpected, so untrue to life. He felt conscious of an enormous shame at the sordidness of the affair, and at the same time of a kind of hopeless recklessness. The worst had happened and the best--that was his sole comfort. Oliver pushed a door open, touched a button, and went through into the suddenly lit room, followed by Percy. Still in silence, he pointed to a chair, Percy sat down, and Oliver stood before the fireplace, his hands deep in the pockets of his jacket, slightly turned away.