Far below were the lights of the castle, and across an unbroken
waste of whiteness the gleams of the village. The air was keen as
an essence of points and edges, and the thought of the kitchen fire
grew pleasant. Cosmo took Joan's hand, and down the hill they ran,
swiftly descending what they had toilsomely climbed.
As she ran, the thought that one of those lights was burning by the
body of her father, rebuked Joan afresh. She was not glad, and she
could not be sorry! If Cosmo's father were to die, Cosmo would be
both sorry and glad! But the boy turned his face, ever and again as
they ran, up to hers--she was a little taller than he--and his
every look comforted her. An attendant boy-angel he seemed, whose
business it was to rebuke and console her. If he were her brother,
she would be well content never more to leave the savage place! For
the strange old man in the red night-cap was such a gentleman! and
this odd boy, absolutely unnatural in his goodness, was
nevertheless charming! She did not yet know that goodness is the
only nature. She regarded it as a noble sort of disease--as
something at least which it was possible to have too much of. She
had not a suspicion that goodness and nothing else is life and
health--that what the universe demands of us is to be good boys and
girls.
To judge religion we must have it--not stare at it from the bottom
of a seeming interminable ladder. When she reached the door, she
felt as if waking out of a dream, in which she had been led along
strange paths by a curious angel.
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