She closed her eyes. His fine rich voice came to her from a long way off. Let him boom as loudly as he pleased, he could not touch her any more. She had escaped, and for ever. She saw, then, Morris as she had seen him at that tea-party months ago. She recovered that strange sense that she had had (and that he had had too, as she knew) of being carried out right away from one's body into an atmosphere of fire and heat and sudden cold. They had no more been able to avoid that look that they had exchanged than they had been able to escape being born. Let it then stay at that. She wanted nothing more than that. Only that look must be exchanged again. She was hungry, starving for it. She _must_ see him often, continually. She must be able to look at him, touch the sleeve of his coat, hear his voice. She must be able to do things for him, little simple things that no one else could do. She wanted no more than that. Only to be near to him and to see that he was cared for...looked after. Surely that was not wrong. No one could say.... Little shivers ran continually about her body, and her hands, clenched tightly, were damp within her gloves. The Precentor gave out the words of the Anthem, "Little children, love one another." Every one rose--save Lady St. Leath, who settled herself magnificently in her seat and looked about her as though she challenged anybody to tell her that she was wrong to do so. Yes, that was all Amy Brandon wanted. Who could say that she was wrong to want it? The little battle was concluded. Old Canon Foster was preaching to-day. Always at the conclusion of the Anthem certain ruffians, visitors, tourists, clattered out. No sermon for them. They did not matter very greatly because they were far away at the back of the nave, and nobody need look at them; but on Foster's preaching days certain of the aristocracy also retired, and this was disconcerting because their seats were prominent ones and their dresses were of silk. Often Lady St. Leath was one of these, but to-day she was sunk into a kind of stupor and did not move. Mrs. Combermere, Ellen Stiles and Mrs. Sampson were the guilty ones. Rustle of their dresses, the heavy flop of the side Cloister door as it closed behind them, and then silence once more and the thin angry voice of Canon Foster, "Let us pray." Out in the grey Cloisters it was charming. The mild April sun flooded the square of grass that lay in the middle of the thick rounded pillars like a floor of bright green glass. The ladies stood for a moment looking out into the sunny silence. The Cathedral was hushed behind them; Ellen Stiles was looking very gay and very hideous in a large hat stifled with flowers, set sideways on her head, and a bright purple silk dress pulled in tightly at the waist, rising to high puffed shoulders. Her figure was not suited to the fashion of the day.