"Happiness?" she shivered. "Isn't it cold to-night? Do you see that strange green cloud? Ah, now it is gone. All the light is going.... Do you believe in God?" He came closer to her. His hand touched her arm. "Yes," he answered fiercely. "And He means me to care for you." His hand, trembling, stroked her arm. She did not move. His hand, shaking, touched her neck. He bent forward and kissed her neck, her mouth, then her eyes. She leant her head wearily for an instant on his shoulder, then, whispering good-night, she turned and went quietly up the path. Chapter II Souls on Sunday I must have been thirteen or fourteen years of age--it may have been indeed in this very year '97--when I first read Stevenson's story of _Treasure Island_. It is the fashion, I believe, now with the Clever Solemn Ones to despise Stevenson as a writer of romantic Tushery, All the same, if it's realism they want I'm still waiting to see something more realistic than Pew or Long John Silver. Realism may depend as truly on a blind man's tap with his stick upon the ground as on any number of adulteries. In those young years, thank God, I knew nothing about realism and read the tale for what it was worth. And it was worth three hundred bags of gold. Now, on looking back, it seems to me that the spirit that overtook our town just at this time was very like the spirit that seized upon Dr. Livesey, young Hawkins and the rest when they discovered the dead Buccaneer's map. This is no forced parallel. It was with a real sense of adventure that the Whispering began about the Brandons and Ronder and the Pybus St. Anthony living and the rest of it. Where did the Whispering start? Who can ever tell? Our Polchester Whispering was carried on and fostered very largely by our servants. As in every village and town in Glebeshire, the intermarrying that had been going on for generations was astonishing. Every servant- maid, every errand-boy, every gardener and coachman in Polchester was cousin, brother or sister to every other servant-maid, errand-boy, gardener and coachman. They made, these people, a perfect net about our town. The things that they carried from house to house, however, were never the actual things; they were simply the material from which the actual things were made. Nor was the construction of the actual tale positively malicious; it was only that our eyes were caught by the drama of life and we could not help but exclaim with little gasps and cries at the wonderful excitement of the history that we saw. Our treasure-hunting was simply for the fun of the thrill of the chase, not at all that we wished harm to a soul in the world. If, on occasion, a slight hint of maliciousness did find its place with us, it was only because in this insecure world it is delightful to reaffirm our own security as we watch our neighbours topple over. We do not wish them to "topple," but if somebody has got to fall we would rather it were not ourselves.