"Don't you think Papa looks very badly, Isabelle? And he seems so absent, as if he had something on his mind. I noticed it long before this happened."
Isabelle laughed carelessly. "What a girl you are, Marion! You are always imagining things about people. For my part I have too many worries of my own."
Upstairs Evadne was saying wistfully, "Don't you think your life should be very precious, Louis, now that two people have died?"
"Two people, Evadne? I know there was good old Pompey,—the thought of that haunts me night and day,—but who else do you mean?"
"Jesus Christ."
"Oh!"
"Do you never think about him, Louis?"
"My dear coz, I find it wiser not to think. Every other man you meet holds a different creed, and each one thinks his is the right one. Why should I set myself up as knowing better than other people? The only way is to have a sort of nebulous faith. God will not expect too much of us, if we do the best we can."
"A 'nebulous faith' will not save you, Louis," Evadne answered sadly. "God expects us to believe his word when he tells us that he has opened a way for us into the Holiest by the blood of his Son."
"That atonement theory is an uncanny doctrine."