"What I have seen of the local Catholicism strikes me as a kind of pantomime. That is the fault of my upbringing, no doubt."
"Oh, I am not referring to externals! Externally, of course, our Church is the purest rococo—"
Mr. Heard was expanding in this congenial atmosphere; he felt himself in touch with permanent things. He glanced at the speaker. How charming he looked, this silvery-haired old aristocrat! His ample and gracious personality, his leisurely discourse—how well they accorded with the environment! He suggested, in manner, the secret of youth and all that is glad, unclouded, eternal; he was a reflection, a belated flower, of the classic splendour which lay in ruins about him. Such a man, he thought, deserves to be happy and successful. What joy it must have been to a person of his temperament—the chance discovery of the Locri Faun!
A great stillness brooded upon the enclosure beyond. The shadows had shifted. Sunny patches lay, distributed in fresh patterns, upon the old brickwork flooring. An oval shaft of light, glinting through the foliage, had struck the pedestal of the Faun and was stealthily crawling up its polished surface. He looked at the statue. It was still slumbering in the shade. But a subtle change had spread over the figure, or was it, he wondered, merely a change in the state of his own mind, due to what the Count had said? There was energy, now, in those tense muscles. The slightest touch, he felt, would unseal the enchantment and cause life to flow through the dull metal.
Mr. van Koppen was slightly ruffled.
"Are you not a little hard on the Puritans?" he asked. "Where would we have been without them in America?"
"And after all," added the bishop, "they cleared up an infinity of abuses. They were temperate, at all events! Too temperate in some matters, I am inclined to think; they did not always allow for human weakness. They went straight back to the Bible."
The Count shook his head slowly.
"The Bible," he said, "is the most intemperate book I have ever read."
"Dear me!"