Basil shuddered. There was something so poignant and forceful in her words that they hurt, stung like a whip-lash. He was being brought into terrible contact not only with sin and the satiety of sin, but with its results. The hideous staleness and torture of it all appalled him as he looked at this human personification of it in the crimson gown. "That's how it was at first," she continued. "I knew there was something more than this in life, though. I could read it in people's faces. So I came to the service at your church one Sunday evening. I'd never made fun of religion and all that at any time. I simply couldn't believe it, that was all. Then I heard you preach on the Resurrection. I heard all the proofs for the first time. Of course, I could see there wasn't any doubt about the matter at all. Then, curiously, directly I began to _believe_ in it I began to hate the way I was going on, so I went to Father Ripon, who was very nice, and he said you'd call." "I quite understand you, Miss Hunt," said Gortre. "That's the beauty of faith. When once you believe, then you've _got_ to change. It's a great pity, a very great pity, that clergymen don't attempt to explain things more than they do. If one isn't built in a certain way, I can quite understand and sympathise with any one who isn't able to take a parson's mere statement on trust, so to speak. But that's beside the way. _You_ believe at any rate. And now what are you going to do? I'm here to help you in every possible way. I want to hear your views, just as you have thought them out." "I like that," she said. "That's practical and sensible. I've never cared very much for sentimental ways of looking at things. You know I can't live very long. I've got enough to live quietly on for some years, put away in a bank, money I've made acting. I haven't spent a penny of my salary for years--I've made the men pay for everything. I shall go quietly away to the country and be alone with my thoughts, close to a little quiet church. You'll find a place for me, won't you? That's what I want to do. But there's something in the way, and a big something, too." "I'm here to help that," said Basil. "It's Bob," she answered. "The man that keeps me. I'm afraid of him. He's been away for months, out of England, but he's coming back at once. To-morrow as likely as not, he couldn't say to a day. I had a letter from Brindisi last week. He's been to Palestine, _via_ Alexandria." A quick premonition took hold of the young man. "Who is he?" he asked. She took a photograph from the mantel-shelf and gave it to him. It was one of the Stereoscopic Company's series of "celebrities." Under the portrait was printed--"Sir Robert Llwellyn." Gortre started violently. "I know him," he said thickly. "I felt when I met him--What does it all mean?" He dropped his head into his hands, filled with the old, nameless, unreasoning fear. She looked steadily at him, wondering at his manner.