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man, do you know.
He laughed nervously as he spoke and, looking up into
Stephen’s face with moved and friendly eyes, said:
—Do you know that you are an excitable man?
—I daresay I am, said Stephen, laughing also.
Their minds, lately estranged, seemed suddenly to have
been drawn closer, one to the other.
—Do you believe in the eucharist? Cranly asked.
—I do not, Stephen said.
—Do you disbelieve then?
—I neither believe in it nor disbelieve in it, Stephen an-
swered.
—Many persons have doubts, even religious persons, yet
they overcome them or put them aside, Cranly said. Are
your doubts on that point too strong?
—I do not wish to overcome them, Stephen answered.
Cranly, embarrassed for a moment, took another fig from
his pocket and was about to eat it when Stephen said:
—Don’t, please. You cannot discuss this question with
your mouth full of chewed fig.
Cranly examined the fig by the light of a lamp under
which he halted. Then he smelt it with both nostrils, bit a
tiny piece, spat it out and threw the fig rudely into the gut-
ter.
Addressing it as it lay, he said:
—Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire!
Taking Stephen’s arms, he went on again and said:
—Do you not fear that those words may be spoken to you
on the day of Judgement?

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