make it keen and eager which I have found by experience do so. No, when I stick in my work, I don't pray."

"But that is the essence of good work," said May; "it is that which makes it good, the fact that it is done in a spirit of dedication."

"But, do you then think that a good man, in so far as he is good and dedicates his work to God, necessarily produces good work?" asked Tom.

"I mean that a man who has a gift in any line, uses his gift best and produces more beautiful things if he dedicates it. Why, Tom, look at the difference between your things and Mr. Manvers's. I think he is not a good man, and I think his things are not good for that reason."

Tom sat down again.

"It all depends on what you mean by good and bad work," he said. “I think the object of a beautiful thing is only to be beautiful, and I think his things are bad because they are uglyat least, they seem to me ugly."

"But the object of all beauty is to bring us nearer God," said May.

"Yet a work of art which arouses religious emotions is not a better work of art than one which does not. Otherwise, a chromolithograph of the Sistine Madonna would be a better work of art than that terrible splendid Salome in the Louvre."

"I think Mr. Manvers's things are immoral," said May. "You don't understand, dear," he said. "His things, so I think, are bad because he has a debased taste. It is his artistic sense that is warped, and it is that which shows in his things, and not his character. Besides, I think you are not fair to him, May."

"Oh, but, Tom," she said with indignation in her voice, "think of his life, that life among those Paris artists, that horrible vice, and carelessness of living."

Tom smiled.

"Where did you learn about the life of Paris artists?" he asked. "Manvers says they are most inoffensive little people as a rule." "I read all about it in 'David Grieve,'" said May seriously. "It is horrible."

This time he laughed right out.

"Oh, May, you are a darling!" he said. "Oh dear, how funny! I'm so sorry for laughing, but really it is funny. Have you ever heard Manvers talk about that? He becomes quite virtuous and indignant over it. I don't know much about Paris life myself, but Manvers he does not strike you as very like any character there, does he?"

May joined in Tom's laugh, but grew serious again.

"You know I feel about it very deeply," she said; "there is nothing in the world I feel about so much. I think it is our first duty not to condone by word or deed that side of things. To let people know that one will not tolerate it, to fight against it, to— to show that one loathes it."

"Do you mean you want me never to see Manvers again?" asked Tom.

"No, not that," said May, "because you know him well, and he is very fond of you, and I think you do him good. But couldn't you do him more good? Couldn't you talk to him about it, and bear your testimony?"

"No, dear," said Tom quietly, "I couldn't possibly. It is not my business. I know Manvers as a friend, as an excellent companion, as a most amusing fellow. Why, May, he would think I was mad. Men do not talk to each other about such things." "But surely it is our business," said May. "Tom, you don't think me tiresome, do you?"

Tom smiled, and took up her hand again.

My darling, I happen to love you," he said, "and it does not occur to one to think a person one loves tiresome."

May went on with gathering earnestness.

Surely it is our business," she said. "You believe in God, you believe in Christ, in His infinite love, His infinite care for all. Surely it is your first business to help in His work. I remember what you told me about that early celebration you went to. It completed my happiness: it was that I was waiting for, and I thank God for it day and night. I longed to see you more and talk about it, but you went up to London so soon after, and I have scarcely seen you."

Tom's eyebrows contracted. It was impossible for him to let May be deceived, but what he had to do was most distasteful to him. May's eyes were fixed on his, full of love and trust, but with a question in them, a desire to be confirmed in what she had said.

"May, I am going to hurt you," he said, looking away, "but I cannot help it; I cannot let you think something about me which is not true. I think I overrated that I mean that I thought more of it than it really meant to me. The day before I was in agonies of anxiety and fear for you, and that afternoon Ted and I met the funeral of a mother who had just died in child-bed, and on my way home, as I told you, I went into the church and prayed to an unknown God that you might be safe. I could not bear it alone. And then next morning I could not bear my joy

alone. I had-I was obliged to thank some one for it, the some one who had heard my prayer the evening before. And now the whole thing has faded a little. I am less sure. I do not deny that God heard my prayer, and stretched out His hand to save us, but it is less real to me. Supposing you had died, should I have denied absolutely the existence of God? I hope not. Then why should I affirm it because you lived?"

Tom's voice had sunk lower and lower, and he ended in a whisper. But May's hand still lay in his, and she pressed it tenderly.

'Tom, why were you afraid to tell me?" she said. "Ah, my dear, I should be a very weak, poor creature if this separated me at all from you, or made me doubt you. What did you think of me? Of course I am sorry, and yet I am hardly sorry. Am I to dictate to God by what way He shall lead you? He has not led you that way, it was not good. Tom, Tom."

She bent forward and kissed him, her arm was pressed round his neck, and her head lay on his breast. As once before, on the evening when they reached Applethorpe before the baby's birth, human love and longing had full possession of her; and as she lay there, she felt only that she loved him. And Tom too was content.

But good moments pass as well as bad ones, and the sense that May lived in a different world to him could not but come back again and again to Tom. He could not but feel that there was a passion in her life in which he had no share, and that passion was the strongest she knew. He had tried to grasp it once he thought he had grasped it, but he was wrong. He was as honest to himself as he was to others, and he admitted that he did not believe in God in the way he believed in May or in Art. The life of Christ was beautiful beyond all other lives, but was it different in kind from the lives of noble unselfish men? Was Christ anything more than the most wonderful, the most unselfish man that the world has ever seen? And from the fact that he could ask himself these questions, Tom knew that he was not convinced. It was just this that was the most essential part of May's life; her love and tenderness for him and others sprang from that, whereas Tom felt that all that was good in him did not descend from above, but grew up from below.

May was certainly less conscious of this than he. She, so to speak, was waiting for him to come, believing fully he would, while he was struggling towards her afraid that his efforts were futile. The least he could do, he felt, and the most, was avoid letting her know that he was so conscious of the gulf between

them. He loved her, he thought, more and more as the days went by, and it should be easy to stifle that little ounce of bitter where all else was so sweet. So long as she loved him, he felt that it would be well with him.

Meantime the London season danced and laughed round them; the plaster model of Demeter was finished and was to be back from the painter's in a few days. May produced a slight stir in a small circle, because she was beautiful, and there is quite an appreciable number of men who prefer that a woman should not talk much, because, as is very justly remarked, if everybody talked much, nobody would have any audience to address. She was always courteous, she always looked admirable, and the general opinion was that Tom had done himself uncommonly well.

Moreover and this was particularly interesting, because it was never spoken above a whisper-Miss Wrexham was not looking at all well, and there really must have been something in what every one was saying last year. Very sad for her, was it not? but a girl should not go about looking pale; of course that set every one talking, and a little rouge, you know, would both conceal the pallor and mitigate the blush. Oh, yes, it happened many times; only last night, in fact, when we were dining there Tom Carlingford's name came up and she blushedseveral people saw her. And she wasn't at Ascot, nor was he, and that is quite conclusive. And besides her going to Athens was so very extraordinary. Oh, she had a brother there, had she? We hadn't heard that, and we shall probably forget it again.

Maud, it must be confessed, did not enjoy herself very much that season. In the natural course of things she met Tom often, and the task of unbuilding that most uncompromising blank wall seemed too disheartening. Every time she saw him she felt that things were getting more and more difficult. What made it worse was that May had unthawed to her, and often asked her to come out with her. May out of the fulness of her heart often spoke of Tom, and talking about Tom was rather emotional work for poor Maud. That terrible evening before Mauvers went away had taken her and thrust her back into all her old hopelessness and blankness. "After all, what good to strive with a life awry? she asked herself, and then because she was pure and good and sweet, she strove and strove till her strength began to give way. If only Tom would leave London, she thought, or if only she could, things would be more possible.

A little scene which had occurred long before often came back

to her during these weeks. One day at their house in Cornwall, she was walking early before breakfast along a narrow country lane. She could almost smell again that sweet intangible scent of morning, the smell of clean things. Now and then a whiff of dogrose came down to her, and now and then a breeze which had swept through a gorse bush came over her face. At the lodge gate she had spoken to the old keeper's wife, whose son had got into trouble. The poor old lady was rather tearful about it, and said: "Lor, miss, if we were good how happy we should be!" She had repeated the remark once to Manvers, who said he thought the old woman had got hold of the wrong end of the stick, and that she would have spoken more truthfully if she had said, "If we were happy, how good we should be!"

That morning she remembered how extraordinarily happy she had been; the whole world had seemed so clean and fresh and wholesome, so delightfully straightforward and uncomplicated. If only she could get back that feeling, just for a moment, she thought she would be rested and ready to begin again. In the old days nothing had seemed hard, nothing out of reach, nothing perplexing. And now her life was spoiled.

One evening, early in June, she was having tea with May, longing for Tom to come in, dreading that he would come. May had sent for the baby to come down, and he was sitting on his mother's knee regarding his toes, which apparently seemed to him very wonderful inventions and quite original, and his mother was taking a sympathetic interest in his discoveries. Maud, who had been quite fascinating to the infant mind till he found out about his toes, had been thrown over, and as May's attention was riveted on her son, she felt just a little out of it. Suddenly May looked up.

"Just fancy," she said, "this little mite is our own, Tom's and mine: I never get quite used to that fact. Yes, darling," she turned her attention to the baby, "how pretty, and that's all yours. Oh, you angel!" Maud felt her breath catch in her throat as the door opened and Tom came in.

"Baby-cult as usual," he said. "How are you, Maud?” Maud could not quite command her voice, but she murmured something. "That surprising infant usurps far too much of May's time," continued he. "May will never quite recognize that one baby is rather like another baby."

May leant over the little sparsely be-haired head.

"What an unnatural papa he's got!" she said; "he says you're like other babies. You know quite well, and so does he, that there never was a baby like you, and never will be!"