Page:The woman, the man, and the monster (IA womanmanmonster00dawe).pdf/205

 case heaven cannot be there any more than it is here with us. Where is it, then?”

“T don’t know.”

“And hell! Once I thought it was away down somewhere in the middle of the earth. Where is hell, Perseus?”

“For many it is here on earth.”

“That’s a quibble. I mean the hell of fire ° and brimstone, the hell of the Christian, the hate that never ceases. Once I feared such hatred, now I despise it. The Roman Catho- ‘lics have their purgatory, a sort of cleansing- house of venial sin. If heaven is above the clouds, and hell beneath the earth, where is purgatory? These places, if they exist, must be somewhere. Tell me, Perseus, what do you think of it all?”

“TI have thought of it until my brain has grown weary, but I cannot fathom it. I am ignorant as a little child.”

“And I babble nonsense unceasingly? Yet why should it be nonsense?”

“Why should it be nonsense? When the intelligent child puts a too pertinent question we check it with the cry of ‘silliness.’ ”

“TI think you understand me,” she whispered.