She had but to go to him, tell him that she was ready, that she would leave all to follow him--She checked herself; even in her thoughts she could not travesty the divine words which related to marriage, but to the sacrament of marriage. Not to leave Him did Our Lord bid His followers leave all to cling to a wife, but rather to come after Him and, thus coming, derive strength to cleave to one spouse in a union transcending the weakness of nature. Back upon its track Cicely’s mind travelled, leaving the thought of Our Lord’s teaching. Rodney bade her prove her love for him. He had reminded her of how indifferent a Catholic she was. It was true. She rarely thought about her faith; it did not form an integral, vital part of her days. She kept to it, but she did not enjoy it, nor did she often draw near to its heart, nor know much about its devotions, live in its calendar year. She dimly knew that some people did these things; Nan came nearer to it than Cis realized, she imagined, but as a rule these things seemed to be fit for nuns. She need never take a definite step, like renouncing her faith overtly. All that she had to do was to marry Rodney. She would have to be married by a civil officer, or a minister; no priest could marry her, of course, and that would put her outside the Church. After that she would go into her own home, and live her life of complete devotion to Rodney. If she had children she would widen out to embrace them in her heart, but Rodney first! Always, always Rodney first! She--they--could teach their children to be upright, kind, good citizens, good moral men and women. Rodney said it was ridiculous to delude yourself into thinking that more than this was needed, or that anyone really knew anything more about life and death than that a man must live in the world decently, and then when he died, if there was anything more for him, he’d be sure to get the good coming to him, because he had not made the world a worse place for anyone else. And if there were nothing beyond but a long, dreamless sleep, and pretty flowers springing out of your ashes--well! Then that’s all there was of it, and you would have played your part creditably and gone out leaving an honored name. Cecily saw Rod’s handsome, laughing face in her memory as it had looked when he had said this, and she heard his jolly, infectious laugh! Oh, how she wanted him, _wanted_ him! The longing for him swept over her like physical sickness, and she shuddered, turning cold. She had left him miserable; she had deserted him. Deserted him in the home he was making for her; she was wrecking his home a second time as that other woman had wrecked his first home. She, Cis, was respectable in the eyes of the world, and that other was not, but was she any better than the outcast?