It was his turn to grow red.
"My brutality, if you choose. I beg your pardon for whatever offended."
"It was unpardonable! It was a thing no woman could ever forgive!"
Maurice turned pale. He stopped where he stood.
"In that case," he said, bowing with formality, "I have no business to be speaking to you now."
He turned and was gone before she could add a word.
This interview probably made neither of the young persons happy; and Maurice it left entirely miserable. He was not without a proper pride, however, and in his present frame of mind was ready to call it to his aid. He bore a brave outward front. He resolved not to think of his love; yet he was not without the hardly confessed hope that if he could find the lost will he might be taking a step in the direction of the realization of his desires. He tried to forget Berenice in the very means he was taking to bring himself nearer to her.
He set out for Montfield one bright February day, amused at himself for the difference in his attitude toward the world from the mere fact that he had discarded the ecclesiastical garb. It gave him a fresh and delightful sensation to be traveling on business in clothing like that of other men. He had no longer any wish to be separated by his dress, and thought with contemptuous amusement of the lurking self-consciousness which had always attached itself in his mind to the fact that he was in a costume apart. He realized now that he had from this derived a certain satisfaction, half simple vanity and half the gratification of his histrionic instinct. He felt as if he had been like a child pleased to attract attention by a feather stuck in his cap, or a toy sword girt at his side. Now that the whole experience was past he could smile at it, but he had small patience with those who still retained the clerical garb. Men have usually little tolerance for the fault which they have but newly outgrown; and Maurice thought with a sort of amazement of his late fellows at the Clergy House, and of their manifest satisfaction in the dress they wore. It was almost with a sensation of self-righteousness that he enjoyed the habiliments of ordinary civilized man.
As the train sped on, and the scenery became more familiar as he approached nearer to Montfield, Maurice naturally fell to thinking, in an irregular, detached fashion, of his youth. Both Wynne's parents had died in his childhood, and there had been little to keep firm the bonds of family. Alice Singleton he had known, however, both as a girl and as the wife of his half brother, but he had known only to dislike and avoid her. He began now to wonder how she would receive him, and whether she would allude to the scene at Mrs. Rangely's when he had broken up her spiritualistic deception.
The train of thought into which reminiscence had plunged him carried him over his whole life. He realized for the first time that his religious experiences had been little more than a reflection of those of Philip. It was Ashe who had interested him in spiritual things, who had led him into the church, who had practically determined for him that he should become a priest. For the first time, and with profound amazement, Maurice realized how completely his theological life had been the growth of the mind of Ashe rather than of his own. The thought brought with it a sense of weakness and self-contempt.