The long street leading to the church was thronged with people who walked slowly, smiling and talking to each other, either going towards the lanes beyond the little town, or towards the sea. But a third sort, much smaller in number, threaded rather quickly in and out of the gently-moving crowds with an air of obeying some purpose within themselves and not merely enjoying the lull in the wind at sundown and the warm air. And above it all, clanging out from the grey tower, the last bell rang out a single note urgently: “Come! Come! Come!”

A good many did not notice the bell at all; others just took it in as a sound of Sunday evening which ministered pleasantly to their agreeable feeling of having nothing to do but enjoy themselves; scarcely anyone was troubled by declining that invitation, because the habit of church-going has fallen from the position of a duty to that of a compliment which the religiously disposed are willing to pay their God if quite convenient.

Caroline walked briskly, now and then glancing up at the clock on the tower as if she belonged to the purposeful minority which was making its way to the grey porch. Not that she had started out with any intention of going to the service, but her girl friend had come across an admirer at the church corner, and so it became necessary to do something in self-defence. Impossible to contemplate wandering alone on a Sunday evening without a companion of any sort. The lack of a “boy” for such a purpose made Caroline feel oddly self-conscious as if people were staring at her and wondering. She would have been glad of the young railway porter’s company now, if he had turned up, and would have welcomed him as a sort of refuge.

He sat and smoked on a bench by the sea front, however, all unaware of the opportunity that was rushing past him, never to return. At the last insistent “Come!” Caroline caught sight of Lillie with a young man rounding the next bend of the road, and the idea of being pitied for her solitary condition made her march straight up the flagged path to the church door, as if she had meant going ever since leaving home.

But once inside the church, she experienced a gradual cessation of that prickling awareness of other people’s thoughts and other people’s eyes which had been so uncomfortable on the road. For she was familiar with the service having gone to the Sunday school in childhood and attended church at times since, though the Creddles were chapel folk so that the places in the Prayer Book came automatically to her fingers, and the soothing flow of the words gave her a chance to come to herself. She did not worship in any real sense of the word, but her mind was, despite itself, attuned to peace. “From all the perils and dangers of this night” Then, after an interval during which the sunset struck golden across a tomb in the chancel: “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ . . . now and for evermore. Amen.”

She rose from her knees and her glance fell upon Miss Ethel, who sat a fair distance away in the sparsely filled side aisle. She wondered whether Miss Ethel were a really religious sort or not you never heard her mention a word about it, and she seemed so up against everything

Then the hymn old-fashioned because the Vicar was away and the elderly organist who had chosen it liked that kind best. Perhaps he knew that all religion must at the last be a matter of feeling and not of reason, for he had lived such a long time in the world and really loved God. But the strange preacher who was going to occupy the pulpit looked down the church at the congregation singing and felt they required a great deal of sound teaching. So, being a good man with a high ethical standard, he stepped up into the pulpit and did his best during the opportunity which was at his disposal to correct the effect of what he considered sentimental doggerel.

But as Caroline listened to him, she felt his explanations of a reasonable faith washing away from her mind all the beautiful pictures which had been stored there and had formed part of her life, though she had not valued them. No doubt he meant well; still the explanations took away and gave nothing to fill the empty place. Soon her mind wandered and she caught sight of a hat trimmed in a way that was exceedingly smart and easy enough to copy; so that occupied her attention until she heard the familiar rustle among the congregation and the “Now” which gives release.

The clergyman stood near the east window to give the blessing with a side light slanting across his white surplice, and a thought darted into Caroline’s mind, turning her hot from head to foot Why, that was just how the Vicar would stand with the bride and bridegroom before him at the altar-rails in three weeks’ time! And a vision of Laura in her veil beside Wilson’s broad, strong figure gave her a queer, unhappy feeling of irritation and pain; yet somehow she wanted to indulge the pain to press it in upon her senses by dwelling on it.

Then her healthier instincts suddenly revolted. “It’s nothing to me. I aren’t jealous of another girl getting married! I could be married myself to-morrow if that’s all.” But deep within her she felt it was not all; so rising abruptly she went out, not looking again at the chancel.

Miss Ethel came forth more deliberately, nodding to one here and there among the townspeople as she passed under the porch into the cool evening, but her salutations were not acknowledged with the appearance of gratification or respect which she had seen accorded to her parents years ago young people from shops and post-offices nodded off-handedly back, or at most gave a somewhat condescending “Good evening, Miss Wilson,” feeling in their confident youth and independence that it was they who had done her the favour.

It was all so different; that constant burden of her thoughts And as she walked home through the end of the sunset, the forlorn restlessness of the cat turned out of its basket and forced to wander in cold, strange places seized upon her again. She could not formulate her unease excepting by that one phrase: it was all so different.

When she reached home, Mrs. Bradford looked up with a sort of solid expectancy: “Well, did you have a good sermon?”

“I suppose so. The Vicar was not there. The man we had explained to us that there was no heaven and no God, so I suppose he was very clever.”

Mrs. Bradford stared, then relaxed comfortably into her cushions once more. “Oh, you mean he held those new views about religion,” she said. “I have just been reading a novel that has something about that in it. Was he young? I always like a young preacher, because their voices are generally stronger and you can hear better.”

Miss Ethel had gone to the window and now stood there, looking out. The eyebrow which was affected a little by emotion or excitement gave a slight twitch occasionally and her lips were pressed close together. She saw the little flag on the roof over the privet hedge hanging quiet on the still air, and it added to her sense of being conquered by those forces which had been creeping on steadily, bit by bit, until she could not ignore them any more than the new houses.

But she had never before felt it as she did to-night, looking up at that exquisite clear sky with the sickle moon rising. She was not well, tired with the walk and the service; and a most unwonted pressure of tears ached behind her eyes, though she fiercely fought against them.

“Ethel!” said Mrs. Bradford. “What are you standing there for? Why don’t you go and take off your things for supper?”

“I am going.” Miss Ethel controlled her voice to speak as usual. “I’ll just put the kettle on first, because Caroline won’t be in for some time yet.” And she began to cross the room, when suddenly, abruptly, she stopped short. Standing quite still in the midst of all those heavy chairs and tables that gleamed dimly in the falling dusk, she blurted out in a queer, strangled tone: “I hated that sermon. I don’t think clergymen ought to be allowed to preach like that. They want to change God. They can’t even leave God the same.”

“You really do upset yourself about things so, Ethel,” said Mrs. Bradford fretfully. She wanted her supper. “What does it matter to you what other people think? You should just take no notice and go on in your own way, and believe what you always have believed as I do.”

Miss Ethel made some inarticulate reply, and went out to put on the kettle. Not for any earthly consideration would she have told her sister that that was exactly what she could not do: that because she listened carefully to sermons and read articles about religion the unchanging God was gradually giving place to a vague Power which nebulously adapted itself to the needs of a changing civilization.

The gas-ring spurted under the match in her hand, lighting up with a bluish light her pale, thin face. Her lips moved as she murmured to herself for comfort: “The same yesterday, to-day and for ever.” But she could not find anything to hold on to in that any more.

Then she heard an unexpected sound at the door, and the next minute Caroline came in, drawing off her gloves.

“I’ll see to the hot water, Miss Ethel,” she said.

“You are in early to-night,” said Miss Ethel.

“Yes.” Caroline paused. “Oh, I have been going to tell you that I shall” But with the words nearly over her lips, she found herself unable to speak them. “Shall be late in to-morrow,” she substituted; for somehow she could not after all cut herself adrift from this house yet, though she came fresh from a conversation which had left her burning with annoyance.

She tingled still at the recollection of one girl saying to another in passing: “That’s Caroline Raby! What’s she doing? Oh, she’s in service.” And at the memory of her own sharply-flung: “I’m not in service, then! I take tickets on the promenade and I’m going into an office after that.”

But though it was evident that she was regarded by some as being in service, and though she felt no higher regard for it than anyone else who has just emerged from women’s oldest and grandest profession, she could not bring herself to break the threads which held her to these two women and to something beyond them which she would not realize. But after she was in bed, she could see in the darkness the church window in the sunset, and the altar rails, and the clergyman standing as he would do when Wilson and Laura were married.

So the three women lay in bed, thinking their own thoughts, with the sea moaning moaning as it broke in a long even wave and withdrew on the soft sand; quite a different sound every day, though Miss Ethel had heard it for fifty-six years. But she was scarcely conscious of hearing it at all, though it had formed an accompaniment to every thought and action of her life during all those years.

But to-night perhaps because it was so warm and still, and she had the window facing the sea wide open she did really listen to the waves; and that sound might perhaps have comforted her, with its deep note of unhasting permanence, if the ears of her mind had also been open to hear. But she only felt its melancholy. It seemed to accentuate her forlorn sense of having nothing stationary to hold on to, not even an unchanging God.