"Of course, Baroness Puckha Bilj had not your advantages," continued the undaunted Sir Joseph. "She was already advanced in years when she left Hungary." "Have some cake?" said Mrs. Delarayne. "I admit," Lord Henry was saying, "that a new religion is perhaps the most urgent need of modern times; but then this Age is scarcely great enough to make it." "Come, come!" exclaimed Sir Lionel gruffly, his melancholy eyes closing heavily as he spoke, "you are a little hard surely. Is not this your first attendance here? I don't seem to remember having seen you amongst us before." Lord Henry apologised and turned away. He had noticed his hostess's eye upon him, and he hastened towards her. "Sir Lionel's conversation seems to have been singularly engrossing," remarked Mrs. Delarayne as he approached. "It always amazes me," declared the young nobleman with laughter in his eyes, "how the men of the so-called 'exact sciences' become involved in our new emergency substitutes for a great Faith." Mrs. Delarayne purred with a slightly treble note of dissent. "Why not?" Sir Joseph demanded. "I suppose it is the refuge of the mind that deals only with precise and exact terms and rules, to plunge into the opposite extreme,--into blue mistiness for instance. Or is it perhaps the fact that mathematicians and physicists deal very largely with symbols, with abstractions as opposed to realities, and that they therefore easily fall a prey to this sort of thing?" Sir Joseph shrugged his shoulders and tried hard to look wise. "The worst of it is," Lord Henry pursued, "the adherence of a man like Borridge, makes lesser men imagine that the creed to which he lends his support, must have something in it." Mrs. Delarayne contented herself with pouting, and casting a glance full of distress signals at Sir Joseph. But Sir Joseph appeared not to notice, and taking unnecessarily large bites at a piece of cake he held, was evidently hoping to convey the impression that a sudden and inconvenient access of appetite prevented his opposing Lord Henry as violently as he might otherwise have done on the subject of the Inner Light. The occupants of the room were beginning to revolve in that purposeful manner which augurs of leave-taking. People came up to shake hands with their hostess, and gradually the library emptied. Only Denis Malster, St. Maur, Sir Joseph, and Lord Henry remained. Their hostess fidgeted uneasily. She wished to be alone with Lord Henry. Gradually the others understood, and ultimately took their leave. "Now quickly, explain to me," Lord Henry began severely, "why you have anything to do with this arrant nonsense. Surely it would be more dignified, more sensible to be a Christian again, than to lend your support to this inferior modern bunkum?" Mrs. Delarayne, with her elbow on the mantelpiece and her chin in her hand, stood sulking and was mute. "Good Heavens! The Inner Light!" He strode towards her. "Promise me you'll give it up," he said.