She kept her eyes on his, at this, for a grave moment, letting it have its full stress as she took it up with, “Could it? With death at the end of it?” and without waiting for his answer she passed from the personal moment. “You said that life was worth while, and you meant, I suppose, that it was worth while because we were capable of making it good rather than evil.”
“Well, of course,” said Grainger.
“And a real choice between good and evil is only possible to a real identity, you’ll own?”
“If you are going to talk metaphysics I’ll cut and run, I warn you. Socratic methods of tripping one up always infuriate me.”
“I’m only trying to talk common-sense.”
“Well, go on. I agree to what you say of a real identity. We’ve that, of course.”
“Well, then, can an identity destroyed at death by the destruction of the body be called real? It can’t, Jim. It’s either only a result of the body, a merely materialistic phenomenon, or else it is a transient, unreal aspect of some supremely real World-Self and its good and its evil just as fated by that Self’s way of thinking it as the color of its hair and eyes is fated by nature. And if that were so the sense of freedom, of identity, that gives us our only sanction for goodness, truth, and worth, would be a mere illusion.”
Her earnestness, as she worked it out for him, held his eyes more than her words his thoughts. He was observing her with such a softening of expression as rarely showed itself on his virile countenance.
“You’ve thought it all out, haven’t you?” he said.
“I’ve tried to. Knowing Gavan has made me. It has converted me,” she smiled.