"I have told you what belief is—I could tell you what love is; you know no more the one than the other. But why should I? I doubt if you would understand. You think you couldn't be shocked. I should shock you. Let it be. I think I could charm you, too. Let that be."
A pause followed. Stafford still sat motionless, but his face gradually changed from its stern aspect to the look that Morewood had once caught on his canvas.
"You're in love with her still?" he exclaimed.
"Still?"
"Yes. Haven't you conquered it? I'm a poor hand at preaching, but, by Jove! If I thought like you, I'd never think of the girl again."
"I mean to marry her," said Stafford quietly. "I have chosen."
Morewood was in very truth shocked. But Stafford's morals, after all, were not his care.
"Perhaps she won't have you," he suggested at last, as though it were a happy solution.
Stafford laughed outright.
"Then I could go back to my priesthood, I suppose?"