by which he
consulted his watch, had flickered out, he lay a long time staring at
the dark.

Silence still reigned supreme, when at last he got up, washed and
dressed, and went downstairs. An irresistible restlessness had seized
hold of him.

He pulled on his furs, cautiously opened the door, and went out--down,
over the crisp new crust, to the river and back in the dimness, past
the Fathers' House to the settlement behind, then to the right towards
the hillside. As he stumbled up the slope he came to a little
burial-ground. Half hidden in the snow, white wooden crosses marked the
graves. "And here I shall be buried," she had said--"here." He came
down the hill and round by the Sisters' House.

That window! That was where a light had shone the evening they arrived,
and a nun--Sister Winifred--had stood drawing the thick curtains,
shutting out the world.

He thought, in the intense stillness, that he heard sounds from that
upper room. Yes, surely an infant's cry.

A curious, heavy-hearted feeling came upon him, as he turned away, and
went slowly back towards the other house.

He halted a moment under the Cross, and stared up at it. The door of
the Fathers' House opened, and the Travelling Priest stood on the
threshold. The Boy went over to him, nodding good-morning.

"So you are all ready--eager to go from us?"

"No; but, you see--"

"I see."

He held the door open, and the Boy went in.

"I don't believe the Colonel's awake yet," he said, as he took off his
furs. "I'll just run up and rouse him."

"It is very early"--the priest laid his hand on the young man's
arm--"and he will not sleep so well for many a night to come. It is an
hour till breakfast."

Henry had lit the fire, and now left it roaring. The priest took a
chair, and pushed one forward for his guest.

The Boy sat down, stretched his legs out straight towards the fire, and
lifting his hands, clasped them behind his head. The priest read the
homesick face like a book.

"Why are you up here?" Before there was time for reply he added:
"Surely a young man like you could find, nearer home, many a gate ajar.
And you must have had glimpses through of--things many and fair."

"Oh, yes, I've had glimpses of those things."

"Well----"

"What I wanted most I never saw."

"You wanted----"

"To be--_sure_."

"Ah! it is one of the results of agnosticism."

The Boy never saw the smile.

"I've said--and I was not lying--that I came away to sho