He translated for her: " 'Now no more shall a glad home and a true wife welcome thee, nor darling children race to snatch thy first kisses and touch thy heart with a sweet silent content; no more mayest thou be prosperous in thy doings and a defence to thine own; alas and woe!' say they, 'one disastrous day has taken all these prizes of thy life away from thee'--but thereat they do not add this, 'and now no more does any longing for these things assail thee.' This did their thought but clearly see and their speech follow they would deliver themselves from much burning of the heart and dread. 'Thou, indeed, as thou art sunk in the sleep of death, wilt so be for the rest of the ages, severed from all weariness and pain.' . . . "Yet again, were the nature of things to utter a voice and thus with her own lips upbraid one of us, 'What ails thee, O mortal, that thou fallest into such vain lamentation? Why weep and wail at death? For has thy past life and overspent been sweet to thee, and not all the good thereof, as though poured into a cracked pitcher, has run through and perished without joy, why dost thou not retire like a banqueter filled with life, and, calmly, O fool, take thy sleep? But if all thou hast had is perished and spilled and thy life is hateful, why seekest thou yet to add more which shall once again all perish and fall joylessly away? Why not rather make an end of life and labor? For there is nothing more that I can contrive and invent for thy delight; all things are the same forever. Even were thy body not yet withered, nor thy limbs weary and worn, yet all things remain the same, didst thou live on through all the generations. Nay, even wert thou never doomed to die'--what is our answer?" "Don't you believe in God?" asked Matilda. It came like a question from a child, and he had the adult's difficulty in answering it, the doubt as to the interpretation that will be put upon his reply. "I believe," he said slowly, "in the life everlasting, but my life has a beginning and an end." "And you don't think you go to Heaven or Hell when you're--when you're dead?" "Into the ground," he said. Matilda shivered, and she looked crushed and miserable. "Why did you read that to me?" she said at last. "I was so happy before. . . . I've always had a feeling that you weren't like ordinary people." And she seemed to wait for him to say something, but his mind harped only on the words: "For there is nothing more that I can contrive and invent for thy delight," and he said nothing. She rose wearily and took her hat and coat and the musquash collar that had been her pride, and left him.