Paul did feel ill, although he shook his head in denial. He felt as though his mouth were full of blood, yet a tiny germ of hope was springing up in the midst of his distress.

‘I shall fall down dead, my heart will break; and then, at least, there will be an end of everything.’

He went down into the church again to hear the confessions of the women, and saw his mother at the bottom of the nave near the door. Stern and motionless she knelt there, keeping watch over all who entered the church, over the whole church itself, ready, apparently, to support and hold it up were it even to collapse upon her head.

But he had no more courage left: only that tiny germ of hope within his heart, the hope of death, grew and grew till the breath in him stifled and failed.

When he was seated inside the confessional he felt somewhat calmer; it was like being in a grave, but at least he was hidden from view and could look his horror in the face. The subdued whispering of the women behind the gratings, broken by their little sighs and their warm breath, was like the rustling of lizards in the long grass on the ridge. And Agnes was there too, safe in the secret retreat where he had so often taken her in his thoughts. And the soft breathing of the young women, the scent of their hair and their gala dress, all perfumed with lavender, mingled with his distress and further inflamed his passion.

And he gave them all absolution, absolved them from all their sins, thinking that perhaps before many days had passed he himself would be a suppliant to them for their compassion.

Then he was seized with the craving to get out, to see whether Agnes had arrived. But her seat was empty.

Perhaps she was not coming after all. Yet sometimes she remained at the bottom of the church, kneeling on a chair which her servant brought for her. He turned to look, but saw only his mother’s rigid figure, and as he knelt before the altar and began the Mass, he felt that her soul was bending before God, clothed in her grief as he was clothed in his alb and stole.

Then he determined not to look behind him again, to close his eyes each time he had to turn round to give the blessing. He felt as if he were climbing ever higher up some steep and stony Calvary, and a sensation of giddiness seized him whenever the ritual obliged him to face the congregation. Then he closed his eyes to shut out the sight of the abyss that yawned at his feet; but even through his closed eyelids he saw the carven bench and the figure of Agnes, her black dress standing out in relief against the grey wall of the church.

And Agnes was really there, dressed in black with a black veil round her ivory-white face; her eyes were fixed on her prayer-book, the gilt clasp of which glittered in her black-gloved hands, but she never turned a page. The servant with the head of a slave was kneeling on the floor of the aisle beside the bench, and every now and then she raised her eyes, like a faithful dog, to her mistress’s face, as though in silent sympathy with the sad thoughts that possessed her.