Presently Joan departed upon her long tramp home. She had gone to convey a message to one of Thomasin Tregenza's friends at Paul. And when the girl left him, with a promise to come at all costs upon the next sunny morning, Barron began to think about money again. He found that the larger the imaginary figures, the smaller shadow of discomfort clouded his thoughts. So he decided upon an act of princely generosity, as the result of which resolve peace returned and an unruffled mind. For the musty conventionality of his conclusion, it merely served as a peg upon which to hang thoughts not necessary to set down here. CHAPTER TWO THE PARTING Joan had only told her lover a part of what happened in her home when Thomasin broke her suspicions to Gray Michael. He had taken the matter very seriously indeed, delivered a stern homily and commanded his daughter to read the Book of Ecclesiasticus through thrice. "'The gad-about is a vain thing and a mighty cause for stumblin'.' You mind that, an' take better care hencefarrard to set a right example to other maids an' not lead 'em wrong. Theer shan't be no froward liver under this roof, Joan Tregenza, an' you, as be my awn darter's the last I'd count to find wanderin'." She lied as to particulars. She had no fear of her father now as a man, but hard words always hurt her, and superstition, though she was fast breaking from many forms of it under Barron's tuition, still chained her soul in some directions. Did her father know even a shadow of the truth, some dire and blasting prediction would probably result from it, and though personally he was little to her now, as a mouthpiece of supernatural powers he might bring blighting words upon her; for he walked with God. But Michael's God was Joan's no more. She had fled from that awful divinity to the more beautiful Creator of John Barron. He was kind and gentle, and she loved to hear His voice in the hum of the bees upon the gorse and see His face everywhere in the fair on-coming of spring. Nature, as she understood it now, chimed with the things her mother had taught Joan. She found room for all the old, pretty stories in this new creed. The dear saints fitted in with it, and their wonders and mysteries, and the comprehensive if vague knowledge that "God is Love." She believed she understood the truth about religion at last; and Nature smiled very sweetly at her and shared in the delight of the time. So she walked dreaming on toward the invisible door of her fool's paradise, and never guessed how near it was or what Nature would look like from the other side.