professors and pastor for the last time; it ended me as a Bible
student. I had left the University and the scene of my trial only a
little while before."

He rose as he concluded and took a turn across the room. Then he
faced her, smiling a little sadly.

"Once I might have thought all that Providential. I mean, seeing
the faces of my professors--my judges--last, as the end of my old
life; then seeing your face next--the beginning of the new."

He had long used frankness like this, making no secret of himself,
of her influence over him. It was embarrassing; it declared so
much, assumed so much, that had never been declared or assumed in
any other way. But her stripped and beaten young Samaritan was no
labyrinthine courtier, bescented and bedraped and bedyed with
worldliness and conventions: he came ever in her presence naked of
soul. It was this that empowered her to take the measure of his
feeling for her: it had its effect.

David returned to his chair and looked across with a mixture of
hesitancy and determination.

"I have never spoken to you about my expulsion--my unbelief."

After a painful pause she answered.

"You must be aware that I have noticed your silence. Perhaps you do
not realize how much I have regretted it."