"Yes, yes, and we should endeavour to profit by it. We should spend it, not only in regrets for those who are about to be taken from us, but in thoughts of the future."
Barbara's red lips parted in another "Yes." The future—she was thinking of it. It was easier to think of it than of the old man who was dying.
"Of the future," Mr. Pryor continued, caressing the smooth leather of his book with his ungloved hand, and softly pulling the pendent ribbon, "of the time when we shall be lying—yes, yes, each one of us—as our friend is now." He glanced up at the ceiling, to indicate that he meant Mr. Hayes, taking his beef-tea in the bed-room on the first floor.
The girl said nothing, but looked meditatively at the folds of her dress, as if she were in church. It would have been pleasanter if Mr. Pryor had brought a funeral sermon out of his table drawer, and could have gone on without these embarrassing pauses.
"When our hour is at hand," he said at last, "as—as it must be one of these days. How shall we feel then, Miss Strange?"
Barbara didn't know.
"No," said the vicar, "we don't know. But we must think—we must think. Try to picture yourself in your uncle's position—what would your life look to you if you were lying there now?"
She looked up with a sudden startled flash. "I haven't had my life—it would only look like a beginning," she said with a vision as of a rose-garlanded doorway to a vault. "If I were going to die directly I couldn't feel like Uncle Hayes."
The passionate speech awoke the clergyman's instinct of assent. "No, no," he said, "certainly not. Certainly not." At that moment a message came: "Would Mr. Pryor kindly step up-stairs?" and he went, not altogether sorry to bring his little discourse to a close.
Barbara, left to herself, sat gazing at the window, till at last the hinted smile, which had troubled her companion, betrayed itself in a tender, changeful curve. "Adrian!" she said softly, under her breath. "Oh, how could I? How could I? Adrian! and I thought you didn't care!"