"Shall I go up-stairs to see the baby, or will you bring him down?" "I'll bring him down." And it was a great lump of white flesh with blue eyes and a little red down on its head that she carried in her arms. "And now, Ned, forget the priest and admire your boy." "He seems a beautiful boy, so healthy and sleepy." "I took him out of his bed, but he never cries. Nurse said she never heard of a baby that did not cry. Do you know I'm sometimes tempted to pinch him to see if he can cry." She sat absorbed looking at the baby; and she was so beautiful and so intensely real at that moment that Ned began to forget that she had given the child out to nurse because the priest had told her that she might do so without sin. "I called him after you, Ned. It was Father Stafford who baptised him." "So he has been baptised!" "He was not three days old when he was baptised." "Of course. He could not have gone to heaven if he had not been baptised." "Ned, I don't think it kind of you to say these things to me. You never used to say them." "I am sorry, Ellen; I'll say no more, and I'm glad it was Father Stafford who baptised him. He is the most sensible priest we have. If all the clergy were like him I should find it easier to believe." "But religion has nothing to do with the clergy. It is quite possible to think the clergy foolish and yet to believe that the religion is the true one." "I like the clergy far better than their religion, and believe them to be worthy of a better one. I like Father Stafford, and you like having a priest to dinner. Let us ask him." "I'm afraid, Ned, that Father Stafford is getting old. He rarely leaves the house now and Father Maguire does all the work of the parish." She liked clerical gossip; the church was finished, and how Biddy heard the saints singing in the window made a fine tale. "So now we have a local saint." "Yes, and miracles!" "But do you believe in miracles?" "I don't know. I shouldn't like to say. One is not obliged to believe in them." "I'm sure you would enjoy believing in Biddy." "Oh, Ned, how aggressive you are, and the very day you come back." But why hadn't she asked him about America and about his speeches? He had looked forward to telling her about them. She seemed to care nothing about them; even when she spoke about them after dinner, he could see that she was not as much interested in politics as she used to be. However, she wore a white dress and black stockings; her red hair was charmingly pinned up with a tortoise-shell comb, and taking her upon his knee he thought it would be well to please himself with her as she was and forget what she was not.