And now the Bishop advanced with his pastoral staff towards the Cross. Lily crowded all these thoughts out of her consciousness, crammed them into a back drawer of her brain. She was humiliated and penitent that they should be with her at such a moment. She closed her eyes, fastening the eye of her brain upon a needle-point of concentration.

Richard, she thought, Richard.

And now the Bishop turned to the Cross, speaking the first words of the prayer:

“O Lord our God, whose only beloved Son did suffer for us the death upon the Cross, accept at our hands this symbol of His great Atonement, wherewith we commemorate the sacrifice which our brothers made: and grant that they who shall look upon it may ever be mindful of the price that is paid for their redemption: and may learn to live unto Him who died for them, Our Lord and Saviour.”

Richard, she thought, Richard.

The Bishop’s voice, so beautiful, so confident, with such precise modulations, rose and fell:

“To the Honour and Glory of God and in memory of our brothers who laid down their lives for us, we dedicate this Cross in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”

Lily opened her eyes. She saw the Bishop, with his linen sleeves and the medals on his scarf. She saw the tall monument, the work of a good Manchester firm, tastefully executed and paid for by the large, easily afforded subscriptions of grateful business men. But Richard isn’t here, she thought—she knew, with horror: Richard isn’t anywhere. He’s gone. He’s dead.

Giddy on the mouth of a black pit, she faltered, scarcely conscious, swayed forward in an instant’s nausea of pure despair, saved herself just consciously from the fall.

A moment later she realised that she had caught hold of Mary’s hand.

Chapter II

II

MARY was very much startled. She had been wondering whether she ought to have ordered some more of that New Zealand lamb. There was the week-end to think of. Not that any of them liked it so much as the other. And we really must economise over sugar, Mary decided. Nice-minded people had kept up their war-time habits, had ceased to want now what they couldn’t get then. But the War hadn’t cured Maurice of liking his three lumps a cup. As for saving, generally, it wasn’t in her. She was snobbish about it. The idea of doing things stingily simply revolted her. Cooking in margarine, for instance, which most of their neighbours, who were much better off than they were, did as a matter of course. If you hadn’t got the stuff—that was a different matter.

She returned to the service with a violent jerk.

“What’s the matter?” she whispered to Lily. “Are you all right?”