"But it's wrong of life," he said.
She hesitated. "Speaking generally, I agree," she answered, "but why do you say so?"
"That fallen god, that empty temple," he urged, suddenly, almost passionately moved, he could hardly say why.
"I see." She was quite deliberate. "I remember what Arnold said. You have still an idol in the shrine."
"God," said Paul reverently, "only He is no idol."
"There is no god," said Ursula.
If she had lashed him with a whip, he could not have been more startled, more outraged. There, in that sunny window, looking out over that gay garden, this attractive, striking, interesting girl, for whose work and thought he had already a youthful generous impulse, had suddenly blasphemed. And she had done it so coolly, so unemotionally. "There is no god," she had said, exactly as if she had passed a detached criticism on art or verse.
And yet no ringing affirmation, no dogmatic assertion to equal hers, sprang to his lips. Conflict and pain had done more in his heart than he had guessed. "Oh, there must be, there must be!" was all that he could cry, as if he hoped against hope.
Ursula took the picture from his hand and their eyes met. Even in his distress, he saw the miracle. Hers were utterly serene. He knew his own to be inchoate, baffled, grieved. And yet in her serenity, too, was a touch of kindliness, and a kind of deep wonder of understanding as if, despite her empty heaven, she looked on mystery.
Something deep down in him stirred before those eyes of hers. He forgot that he had only known her half a morning. He forgot that he was a man and a Christian, and she was a girl and a heathen. And he forgot entirely that it was the fool who said in his heart there is no god. "Oh," he cried, "you've no idea how down and out I am!"