As Osborne and Nevill descended the steps of the cathedral, the former became conscious of weakness. He passed his arm, through one of his companion's. For awhile both walked on in silence. They were too much occupied with the conflict between their thoughts and their feelings for words. Nevill felt: 'Oh, if I should lose her, what will become of me? I never was serious in my life until now. What a fearful thing it is to go on all one's days treating life as a jest, and then come suddenly upon a fair shy girl, whose word can make life a tragedy or an idyl!' He thought,-- 'What can have happened to Osborne? He amazes me. How can he have lost his faith? Find a love and lose a faith! Monstrous! Find a love and find a faith was the rule. Love first wakened young men to religion. They loved; they could not believe the object of their idolatry was mere clay, destined to melt back into earth, like an apple or snow. He cannot endure the idea that when his eyes close, or when hers, they are to see each other no more. That is what roused me up first. It was the dread that I should lose her for ever when I die that made me think of what I was taught when I was young, and see its beauty and its truth. But Osborne, Osborne, Osborne, how is it with him?' Osborne's thoughts were much less clearly defined. He wondered what brought Nevill there, but the wonder was ill-defined and weak. He was in no particular anxiety to find out why Nevill went to St Paul's. He had a general dim idea that the circumstances fitted in with something in his own case; he was too indolent, too tired, too worn, too weak, too miserable, to try and see where the coincidence lay. But his feelings made up in intensity for the vagueness of his thoughts. Heaven and heaven on earth were vanishing from him at the one time, through the one agency. The same sly awful hand that stole his faith away would steal his darling away also. Oh, misery and desolation! As a last resource he had come to that great temple. When his mind seemed tottering, and the ground was tottering beneath his feet, when the pillars of the heavens were shaken over his head, when the clangour of words falling headlong into ruin had horrified his ears, he had fled to that holy fane, that noble pile, raised by pious hands, frequented by pious souls. He had tried with all his might to force back what had escaped him. He' had failed. The carnival of the beast continued, and, hideous thought, loathsome degradation, intolerable fate, he was compelled not only to look on, but to take part in that revolting saturnalia of reason. Lose her? Of course he should lose her. What could prevent him losing her? Nothing. Oh dreary, bald world, what wert thou made for? What was he made for? Oh mockery, to call into existence such worship of the Divine, such loyal, unselfish love of her as his had been, to snatch both away from him at one swoop, in one fell hour! He could not bear the idea. In order to shut it out he spoke. 'I have had a very long walk. I have eaten nothing all day. You must think me mad, Nevill. I am not quite out of my senses, but I am far from sane,' he said. 'We are just like two newly-convicted felons chained together for the first time. Each of us knows the other has a story that would interest him, and that he will hear; each is so absorbed in his own history he cannot free his mind enough to take any interest in the circumstances of the other,' said Nevill, by way of reply. 'No felon was ever more wretched than I am now; but in other respects I am not as you describe. I am very willing, very anxious, to hear your story. If telling it will relieve your mind, listening to it will distract mine; and I have now no bitterer enemy than my own thoughts.' 'My story,' cried Nevill, 'is one of the commonest in the world; and of all men in the world you are the one I most wanted to meet to-day.' 'I am glad to meet you, Nevill, that is if I can be glad for anything now. What did you want me for?' 'I want to tell you I am in love.' 'Yes, I supposed as much from what you said in the church.' 'I have never been really in love before, and I want you to tell me what you think of me as a man.' 'My dear Nevill, what a question!' 'It is one I am most anxious you should answer honestly. Stop! I must not say honestly. I know enough of you to be certain you are incapable of the smallest, even conventional, dishonesty. Tell me, Osborne, what you think of me as a man?' 'So far as I have seen, I think very highly of you. What an extraordinary position you place me in, Nevill!' 'I place you in an awkward position now, in the hope that you will allow me to place you in a certain other position some day.' Osborne, for the first time, looked at Nevill. He saw the man was haggard and scared. He himself was too much exhausted to take more than a languid interest in the conversation so far. Now he roused up a little, and said,-- 'Go on with what you have to say.' 'What you have told me emboldens me, Osborne. Do you think I should make a bad husband?' 'No, certainly not. This is a still more extraordinary question to ask me.' 'You will see, later on, a good deal depends on it. Suppose a girl were very dear to you, the dearest in all the world, Osborne--' 'Yes,' answered Osborne, drawing up and looking into the eyes of the other. 'Would you advise her to reject an offer of marriage from me?' 'What on earth do you mean, man? You are putting me in a most horrible position, and I don't think you are behaving honourably.' 'Honourably, Osborne! Honourably! Take care.' The dull cheeks flushed, and a light of warning came into the eyes. 'Well, speak on at once, man, and then we shall run no risk of misunderstanding one another.' 'If I proposed to your sister Kate, and she accepted me, would you object to her marrying me?' 'My sister Kate! Do you mean my sister Kate?' 'Yes. Who else did you think I meant?' 'Miss Gordon.' 'Miss Gordon! Good heavens! Osborne, you didn't think me such a scoundrel as to make love or propose to the girl you are engaged to?' 'And have lost,' added Osborne, dropping his chin on his breast, and resuming walking. 'Lost!' cried Nevill. 'Lost! What do you mean? It is you now who are mysterious. What do you mean by lost?' Osborne raised his head and gazed into the other's eyes with a look of desperate hope. 'Nevill, you will answer me a question if I ask you one, as I have answered you, honestly?' 'Most assuredly.' Osborne had not answered the most important question of all, but he could wait. 'Suppose you loved a woman with all your heart and soul--suppose it was your first love-' 'All that is very easy, for it is my case.' 'Suppose you had been accepted, that you believed you were loved in return, that there was no material impediment to your marriage, that you put on the engaged ring with all the solemnity of a private religious service, and that, in putting it on, you extracted a vow from the girl, would you ask that girl to break that vow the next day?' 'My dear fellow, vows spoken in that way do not bind.' 'I think you an honourable man. If you, at the time of engagement, exacted a vow from the girl, would you, as an honourable man, ask your sweetheart to break her vow?' 'It is you who now place me in a horrible position.' 'You can answer. As an honourable man, would you ask your sweetheart to break her vow?' 'As an honourable man I would not. But how does this lose you Miss Gordon?' 'Because if she keep her vows she must not have me.' 'But why, in the name of Heaven?' 'Because I made her vow never to marry any man who did not belong to the church she had been brought up in. She made the vow. And now--' He paused. 'Well, Osborne, and now--' 'I belong to no church. I have lost my faith. I can never, as an honourable man, ask her to marry me.' 'But, my dear fellow,' said Nevill, in a tone of encouragement, 'you never yet knew a woman who refused to marry the man she cared for because of his religious beliefs or disbeliefs.' 'That has nothing whatever to do with the question. The question is, should a man ask the woman he loves to break a solemn vow for his sake? A quick flush of pleasure shot over Nevill's face. By putting Kate in such a position towards him, Osborne indicated, unintentionally no doubt, that he had no objection to him, Nevill, as a brother-in-law. 'Suppose Kate were engaged to you, and at the time of your engagement you asked her to make a solemn pledge never to marry any man who did not conform, would you ask her to break that vow and marry you, though you did not conform?' 'I cannot bring the question home to myself in that way. My case is the direct opposite. How can you be so silly as to lose your faith now that you have won all you want in the world?' 'There is no good in our going into an argument, Nevill. We must take things as they are. I will not press you for an answer. I know what it would be.' 'Although,' said Nevill slowly, deliberately, 'I cannot bring the situation home to me so as to make it mine, I am sure I can give you good advice in the case. You must first of all be prudent, and say nothing for awhile. What has suddenly left you may suddenly come back.' Osborne shook his head drearily. 'I don't say it will. I say it may. Why should it not come back to you as to me? Surely there is a case in point. Here am I, who have been a wanderer all my life, who believed I never should settle down, who cared nothing for spiritual matters, now come almost quite round, turning religious, and thinking of settling down. Why should not such things happen to you?' Again Osborne shook his head. 'You cannot say; you cannot know,' urged Nevill. 'Give yourself time and a chance. I do not see why you should be in any haste about it. The day for the wedding is not fixed yet?' 'No.' 'Very good, Osborne. Don't hurry matters,' said Nevill, forcing a gaiety that would not come naturally. 'Don't hurry matters, and we may make it a double event.' Once more Osborne shook his head. Once more an expression of pleasure passed over Nevill's face. It was quite plain Osborne would not oppose his approaches to Kate. George was now in too disturbed a state of mind to press home the question, and, indeed, there seemed to be no need to press home the question at all, for he had inferentially answered it favourably. For hours they walked about arm-in-arm through the chill dark streets. Now they skirted the enclosures of quiet squares; now they pushed their way through the crowd of a street thronged with people. Nevill was killing time, Osborne was trying to leave memory behind. Anything was better than to recall the past. Even the future might be more cheerfully faced. The future, the future--what was the future? What could the future bring to him? What could the future be to him? Merciful heavens, was he to pass the rest of his days in Benares, worshipping in the temple of Hunooman? Horrible fate! What had he done to merit this? At last, when it was past ten o'clock, Osborne drew up. 'Nevill,' he said,' I can walk no more. Come home.' 'No, no. I am not going back to-night. I could not breathe the air of that place until I am certain. I shall walk about until I am worn out; then I'll get a bed at some hotel or other. I cannot go back until I get Kate's answer. If it is favourable, and I can satisfy you as to my position, and so on, you won't object to me, will you?' 'No, Nevill; no. She is a good girl, Nevill.' 'The best in the world.' 'Oh, Nevill, I had such a dream of my future life. And now there is nothing of it left. It is all gone.' 'It will come back again. Give it time.' 'It will never come back again. Nevill, my life is over before it has well begun.' 'Say nothing to her about it for awhile, and all may be well.' 'She will notice my changed manner.' 'It will be time enough to explain when she speaks.' 'Good-night.' 'Good-night.'