company of faces came about him; faces he had thought friendly, of good men and women whom he knew, yet at that moment did not know, all gathered round Noel, with fingers pointing at her.  He staggered back from that vision, could not bear it, could not recognise this calamity.  With a sort of comfort, yet an aching sense of unreality, his mind flew to all those summer holidays spent in Scotland, Ireland, Cornwall, Wales, by mountain and lake, with his two girls; what sunsets, and turning leaves, birds, beasts, and insects they had watched together!  From their youthful companionship, their eagerness, their confidence in him, he had known so much warmth and pleasure.  If all those memories were true, surely this could not be true.  He felt suddenly that he must hurry back, go straight to Noel, tell her that she had been cruel to him, or assure himself that, for the moment, she had been insane:  His temper rose suddenly, took fire.  He felt anger against her, against every one he knew, against life itself.  Thrusting his hands deep into the pockets of his thin black overcoat, he plunged into that narrow glowing tunnel of the station booking-office, which led back to the crowded streets.  But by the time he reached home his anger had evaporated; he felt nothing but utter lassitude.  It was nine o’clock, and the maids had cleared the dining table.  In despair Noel had gone up to her room.  He had no courage left, and sat down supperless at his little piano, letting his fingers find soft painful harmonies, so that Noel perhaps heard the faint far thrumming of that music through uneasy dreams.  And there he stayed, till it became time for him to go forth to the Old Year’s Midnight Service.

When he returned, Pierson wrapped himself in a rug and lay down on the old sofa in his study.  The maid, coming in next morning to “do” the grate, found him still asleep.  She stood contemplating him in awe; a broad-faced, kindly, fresh-coloured girl.  He lay with his face resting on his hand, his dark, just grizzling hair unruffled, as if he had not stirred all night; his other hand clutched the rug to his chest, and his booted feet protruded beyond it.  To her young eyes he looked rather appallingly neglected.  She gazed with interest at the hollows in his cheeks, and the furrows in his brow, and the lips, dark-moustached and bearded, so tightly compressed, even in. sleep.  Being holy didn’t make a man happy, it seemed!  What fascinated her were the cindery eyelashes resting on the cheeks, the faint movement of face and body as he breathed, the gentle hiss of breath escaping through the twitching nostrils.  She moved nearer, bending down over him, with the childlike notion of counting those lashes.  Her lips parted in readiness to say:  “Oh!” if he waked.  Something in his face, and the little twitches which passed over it, made her feel “that sorry” for him.  He was a gentleman, had money, preached to her every Sunday, and was not so very old—­what more could a man want?  And yet—­he looked so tired, with those cheeks.