Page:Terminations (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1895).djvu/208

196 out that the place was a church. The thought quickly came to him that, since he was tired, he might rest there; so that, after a moment, he had in turn pushed up the leathern curtain and gone in. It was a temple of the old persuasion, and there had evidently been a function—perhaps a service for the dead; the high altar was still a blaze of candles. This was an exhibition he always liked, and he dropped into a seat with relief. More than it had ever yet come home to him it struck him as good that there should be churches.

This one was almost empty and the other altars were dim; a verger shuffled about, an old woman coughed, but it seemed to Stransom there was hospitality in the thick, sweet air. Was it only the savor of the incense, or was it something larger and more guaranteed? He had at any rate quitted the great gray suburb and come nearer to the warm centre. He presently ceased to feel an intruder—he gained at last even a sense of community with the only worshipper in his neighborhood, the sombre presence of a woman, in mourning unrelieved, whose back was all he could see of her, and who had sunk deep into prayer at no great distance from him. He wished he could sink, like her, to the very bottom, be as motionless, as rapt in prostration. After a few moments he shifted his seat; it was almost indelicate to be so aware of her. But Stransom subsequently lost himself altogether; he floated away on the sea of light. If occasions like this had been more frequent in