He sat in the rustic chair opposite the hammock, looking into Nancy's black-lashed eyes of the Irish gray, noting that from nineteen to twenty her neck had broadened at the base the least one might discern, that her face was less full yet richer in suggestion—her face of the odds and ends when she did not smile. At this moment she was not only unsmiling, but excited.
"Oh, Bernal, what is it? Tell me quick. Allan was so vague—though he said he'd always stand by you, no matter what you did. What have you done, Bernal? Is it a college scrape?"
"Oh, that's only Allan's big-hearted way of talking! He's so generous and loyal I think he's often been disappointed that I didn't do something, so he could stand by me. No—no scrapes, Nance, honour bright!"
"But you're leaving——"
"Well, in a way I have done something. I've found I couldn't be a minister as Grandad had set his heart on my being——"
"But if you haven't done anything wicked, why not?"
"Oh, I'm not a believer."
"In what?"
"In anything, I think—except, well, in you and Grandad and—and Allan and Clytie—yes, and in myself, Nance. That's a big point. I believe in myself."
"And you're going because you don't believe in other things?"