Bittacy, relighting his cigar, broke the little spell of silence that
had caught all three.

"It's rather a comforting thought," he said, throwing the match out of
the window, "that life is about us everywhere, and that there is really
no dividing line between what we call organic and inorganic."

"The universe, yes," said Sanderson, "is all one, really. We're puzzled
by the gaps we cannot see across, but as a fact, I suppose, there are no
gaps at all."

Mrs. Bittacy rustled ominously, holding her peace meanwhile. She feared
long words she did not understand. Beelzebub lay hid among too many
syllables.

"In trees and plants especially, there dreams an exquisite life that no
one yet has proved unconscious."

"Or conscious either, Mr. Sanderson," she neatly interjected. "It's only
man that was made after His image, not shrubberies and things...."

Her husband interposed without delay.

"It is not necessary," he explained suavely, "to say that they're alive
in the sense that we are alive. At the same time," with an eye to his
wife, "I see no harm in holding, dear, that all created things contain
some measure of His life Who made them. It's only beautiful to hold that
He created nothing dead. We are not pantheists for all that!" he added
soothingly.