And her mother's voice seemed to answer: "Mother, can't you understand? It's the same God. He hasn't gone out of my life just because I worship Him differently. He couldn't abandon any woman who sacrificed herself for love's sake."
The two voices faded into the past.
But now Aliette realized struggle in her soul. It was as though her soul stood at bay, at bay with some terrible decision; as though her soul were being swept toward some contest whose ending, whether victory or defeat, only God could foresee. Once again she felt panic. Yet how should there be panic here in Key Hatch Church?
Already they were singing the last hymn. This man, this man beside her was called Cavendish. Ronald Cavendish! She could see his eyes, now dropped to the hymn-book, now raised again. She could see his ungloved hands on the pew-rail. She could hear his voice.
And abruptly, panic passed; abruptly, she felt the very spirit of her a-thrill, a-thrill as though to fine music.
7
Hector Brunton's wife and Julia Cavendish's son said good-by to each other in the cottage-twinkling darkness at the foot of Key Hatch hill, shaking hands coolly, impersonally--merest acquaintances. Indeed, Aliette's "Good night, Mr. Cavendish" sounded a hundred times less cordial than Mollie's "I hope we shall meet again, Mr. Wilberforce."
And yet forty-eight hours later Aliette bolted.
She bolted, neither with Cavendish nor from Cavendish. She merely bolted to Devonshire.
To herself she succeeded in pretending that she was running away from Hector, from the inevitable recurrence of his amorousness; to Hector, that--hunting being almost over--Mollie's return to Clyst Fullerford furnished an excellent opportunity for her to pay the annual visit to her home.