"I will have a silver bullet next time," said Andrew, and fell silent. The two friends sat together in the dark for some time without saying anything more. Both were gazing into the shadow that encompassed them and Andrew's hand lay lightly on Sebastian's shoulder. There seemed little need of speech between them at the moment--each knew well enough what the other felt and thought. When Andrew had first entered this mildewed night, he had been curious to hear Sebastian's story and eager to tell his own. Now he felt as if both had been told and judged and found unimportant. There were only three things left of any importance, an ache in the skull, a darkness before the eyes, and the quick sound of scuttling feet in the other corners of the room. After a while, however, Andrew spoke. "Do you think there'll be a next time, Sebastian?" he said, heavily. "Who knows?" said Sebastian, "We are always between God's fingers--now no less than ever." At any other time the words would have struck Andrew as insufferably bigoted and submissive. Now they seemed to him what they were, a calm statement of fact. To Sebastian God was a visible and tangible presence--therefore He was here, in this pit, no more so and no less than He was everywhere. He was with the soldiers in the guardroom, also, as they drank out of empty cups and cut at toy food that stuck to its plate. He was with Dr. Gentian in his study when devils hatched in the fire. No sin could avert that scrutiny, no blasphemy or righteousness deter its penetration by the width of a hair. When the time came for judgment, they should all be judged--meanwhile it behooved them to act according to their lights, for, within their limits of flesh, they were free to do good or evil. God had bound them all with a light, indivisible cord--when He wished, He could gather them up and count them like the buttons on Peggy's button string. In the meantime, He might never lift a finger to avert a present anguish--for so are martyrs left without justification. Andrew wished that he could think of God like that, but he could not. To him God was something vague to pray to, for happiness or against the approach of pain--something which might be there, God was a cushioned pew and a prayer-book and a clergyman in robes as opposed to a hard pew and a long hymn and a preacher in a black Geneva gown. He had never thought much about God except as a superior kind of Archbishop of Canterbury who sat on a cloud and looked at Papists sternly. But Sebastian was a Papist--and Sebastian had taken God in his mouth--and God was with him now. It was very strange and just a little unfair. "They say I'm a traitor," he said idly, "They say the Northern colonies have revolted and there was a fight between our men and the soldiers--and my brother was in it, so I must be a traitor, too."