Matters now went on charmingly. All existence seemed to take a richer
colouring, and there was something, Paul said, which, in Professor
Tyndall's words, 'gave fulness and tone to it, but which he could
neither analyse nor comprehend.' But at last a change came. One morning,
whilst Virginia was arranging Paul's moustaches, she was frightened
almost into a fit by a sudden apparition at the window. It was a
hideous hairy figure, perfectly naked but for a band of silver which it
wore about its neck. For a moment it did nothing but grin and stare;
then, uttering a discordant scream, it flung into Virginia's lap a
filthy piece of carrion, and in an instant it had bounded away with an
almost miraculous activity.
Virginia shrieked with disgust and terror, and clung to Paul's knees for
protection. He, however, in some strange way, seemed unmoved and
preoccupied. All at once, to her intense surprise, she saw his face
light up with an expression of triumphant eagerness. 'The missing link!'
he exclaimed, 'the missing link at last! Thank God.--I beg pardon for
my unspeakable blasphemy--I mean, thank circumstances over which I have
no control. I must this instant go out and hunt for it. Give me some
provisions in a knapsack, for I will not come back till I have caught
it.'
This was a fearful blow to Virginia. She fell at Paul's feet weeping,
and besought him in piteous accents that he would not thus abandon her.
'I must,' said the Professor solemnly, 'for I am going in pursuit of
Truth. To arrive at Truth is man's perfect and most rapturous happiness.
You must surely know that, even if I have forgotten to tell it to you.
To pursue truth--holy truth for holy truth's sake--is a more solemn
pleasure than even frizzling your hair.'
'Oh,' cried. Virginia, hysterically, 'I don't care two straws for truth.
What on earth is the good of it?'
'It is its own end,' said the Professor. 'It is its own exceeding great
reward. I must be off at once in search of it. Good-bye for the present.
Seek truth on your own account, and be unspeakably happy also, because
you know that I am seeking it.'
The Professor remained away for three days. For the first two of them
Virginia was inconsolable. She wandered about mournfully with her head
dejected. She very often sighed; she very often uttered the name of
Paul. At last she surprised herself by exclaiming aloud to the
irresponsive solitude, 'Oh, Paul, until you were gone, I never knew how
passionately I loved you.' No sooner were these words out of her mouth
than she stood still, horror-stricken. 'Alas!' she cried, 'and have I
really come to this? I am in a state of deadly sin, and there is no
priest here to confess to! Alone, alone I must conquer my forbidden love
as I may. But, ah me, what a guilty thing I am!'
As she uttered these words, her eyes fell on a tin box of the
Professor's, marked 'Private,' which he always kept carefully locked,
and which had before now excited her curiosity. Suddenly she became
conscious of a new impulse. 'I will pursue truth!' she exclaimed. 'I
will break that box open, and I will see what is inside it. Ah!' she
added, as with the aid of the poker she at last wrenched off the
padlock. 'Paul may be right, after all. There is more interest in the
pursuit of truth than I thought there was.'
The box was full of papers, letters, and diaries, the greater part of
which were marked 'Strictly private.' Seeing this, Virginia's appetite
for truth became keener than ever. She instantly began her researches.
The more she read, the more eager she became; and the more private
appeared the nature of the documents, the more insatiable did her
thirst for truth grow. To her extreme surprise, she gathered that the
Professor had begun life as a clergyman. There were several photographs
of him in his surplice; and a number of devout prayers, apparently
composed by himself for his own personal use. This discovery was the
result of her labours.
'Certainly,' she said, 'it is one of extreme significance. If Paul was a
priest once, he must be a priest now. Orders are indelible--at least in
the Church of England I know they are.'