ning off to the left a few yards away. She
had never seen him in his clerical dress, so she could not have
recognised him yet. She would only take him for one of the clergy at
the Retreat, he had only to turn down the lane--

But no, his old manhood rose in revolt at the idea. That would be a
flight, a mean, unworthy flight, unworthy alike of himself and the high
resolves that he had taken. It was hard, almost impossible even to think
of _her_ as a temptation, as an enemy to his soul, and yet, even if she
were, as the leaping blood in his veins told him she might be, was it
for him, the young soldier of the Cross, just buckling on his armour, to
turn his back upon the first foe he met, even though that foe had once
been his best beloved? He set his teeth and clenched his hands, and
walked on past the entrance to the lane.

A minute or two later their eyes met. A look of astonished recognition
instantly leapt into hers. She shifted the silver handled walking stick
into her left hand, and held out the other, daintily gauntleted in tan.

"Why Vane!" she exclaimed, in a voice which was still as sweet and soft
as ever, but which seemed to him to have a strange and somewhat
discordant note in it, "you don't mean to say that it's you. I suppose,
as a matter of fact, I ought to say Mr. Maxwell now--I mean now that
you're a clergyman--but after all, those little things don't matter
between such very old friends as we are, and I'm sure Reggie won't mind,
in fact, I shan't let him if he does. Just fancy meeting you here! I
suppose you're one of the Fathers--is that it?--at the little monastery
up there. I've only been home a week, and last night I heard about this
place, so I drove over to see it. But you haven't told me how you are
yet, and how you like your--your new life."

As a matter of fact, she had rattled all this off so quickly that Vane
had not had time to reply to her greeting. He had taken her hand and,
somewhat tremblingly, returned the frank, firm pressure. While she was
speaking, he looked into her face and saw that she had already assumed
the invisible but impenetrable mask in which the society woman plays her
part in the tragic comedy of Vanity Fair. It was the same face and yet
not the same, the same voice and yet a different one, and the sight and
sound acted upon him like a powerful tonic. This was not the Enid he had
loved, after all, at least, so it seemed to him. He had forgotten, or
had never known that