He was bending over her, but at these words he shot upright again like a steel spring. His mother had cut him to the quick. Yes, it was true; during all that hour of perturbation since he had quitted the woman he had thought only of himself.

He tried to withdraw his hand from his mother’s, so hard and cold, but she grasped it so imperatively that he felt as though he had been arrested and were being led bound to prison. Then his thoughts turned again to God; it was God who had bound him, therefore he must submit to be led, but nevertheless he felt the rebellion and desperation of the guilty prisoner who sees no way of escape.

‘Leave me alone,’ he said roughly, dragging his hand away by force, ‘I am no longer a boy, and know myself what is good or bad for me!’

Then the mother felt as though she were turned to stone, for he had practically confessed his fault.

‘No, Paul, you don’t see the wrong you have done. If you did see it you would not speak like that.’

‘Then how should I speak?’

‘You would not shout like that, but you would assure me there is nothing wrong between you and that woman. But that is just what you don’t tell me, because you cannot do so conscientiously, and therefore it is better you should say nothing at all. Don’t speak! I don’t ask it of you now, but think well what you are about, Paul.’

Paul made no reply, but moved slowly from his mother’s side and stood in the middle of the kitchen waiting for her to go on speaking.

‘Paul, I have nothing more to say to you, and I have no wish to say anything more. But I shall talk with God about you.’

Then he sprang back to her side with blazing eyes as though he were about to strike her.

‘Enough!’ he cried, ‘you will be wise never to speak of this again, neither to me nor to anyone else; and keep your fancies to yourself!’

She rose to her feet, stern and resolute, seized him by the arms and forced him to look her straight in the eyes; then she let him go and sat down again, her hands gripping each other tightly in her lap.

Paul moved towards the door, then turned and began to walk up and down the kitchen. The moaning of the wind outside made an accompaniment to the rustle of his clothes, which was like the rustle of a woman’s dress, for he wore a cassock made of silk and his cloak was of the very finest material. And in that moment of indecision, when he felt himself caught in a whirlpool of conflicting emotions, even that silken rustle seemed to speak and warn him that henceforth his life would be but a maze of errors and light things and vileness. Everything spoke to him; the wind outside, that recalled the long loneliness of his youth, and inside the house the mournful figure of his mother, the sound of his own steps, the sight of his own shadow on the floor. To and fro he walked, to and fro, treading on his shadow as he sought to overcome and stamp down his own self. He thought with pride that he had no need of any supernatural aid, such as he had invoked to save him, and then immediately this pride filled him with terror.