The still church, the faint fumes of incense, the sudden flash in the dusky shadows of cross and pictured face, all influenced his singularly impressionable nature. He felt lifted up from the things of this earth into a higher region of spirituality, and in the exaltation of the moment felt inclined to kneel down on the cold pavement and lift up his voice in prayer. But the mocking spirit of disbelief, the spirit which denies, damped this sudden impulse of strong faith, and he sat there in the cold twilight, pitying himself profoundedly with the self-commiseration of an egotist, for the weariness of his life, which came from the selfishness of his own actions. "How infinitely dreary is this life of ours, with its cant and humbug, its hollow aspirations and unsatisfying rewards. We try to make ourselves happy and only succeed in rendering ourselves cynical. If there were only some chance of compensation in the next world, but that is such a doubtful point. We are like wanderers on a lonely moor misled by false lights--false lights of our own creation. We know nothing, we can prove nothing, we believe nothing--not very gratifying after eighteen centuries of Christianity. After all, I daresay that old Greek philosopher was right, who said 'Eat, drink, for to-morrow we die.' Still, one grows weary of eating, and drinking, and other things--especially other things. Marriage, for instance--I ought to marry, and yet--it's such a hazardous experiment. I would tire of the best woman breathing, unless I chanced on the other half of myself, according to Plato's theory. That, I'm afraid, is impossible, though it certainly hasn't been for the want of trying. I've loved a good many women, but the passion has only lasted the life of a rose." At this moment of his reflections he chanced to raise his eyes, and saw in front of him a picture of the Madonna, with the calm look of maternity on her face, and this sight turned his thoughts in the direction of Lady Errington. "It is curious that I should be so attracted by that woman. I wonder what can be the reason. She is not particularly brilliant, nor clever, nor exquisitely beautiful, and yet she seems to satisfy that hunger of the soul I have felt all my life. One can think, but not describe a woman's character, even the most shallow woman's; there is always something that escapes one. Alizon Errington has that something, and it is that which attracts me so powerfully. That calm, reposeful, sympathetic nature which appeals so strongly to a worn-out soul. If I were ill, I would like her to sit beside me and lay her cool hand on my forehead--she is like moonlight, dreamy, restful and indescribable.