"
"Fine, if true" I admitted, "very fine. But how, pray, does it include
them all?"
"Because the key-word, the motto, of their Society is, 'There is no
religion higher than Truth,' and it has no single dogma of any kind.
Above all," she went on, "because it claims that no individual can be
'lost.' It teaches universal salvation. To damn outsiders is
uncivilized, childish, impure. Some take longer than others--it's
according to the way they think and live--but all find peace, through
development, in the end. What the creeds call a hopeless soul, it
regards as a soul having further to go. There is no damnation--"
"Well, well," I exclaimed, feeling that she rode her hobby horse too
wildly, too roughly over me, "but what is the bearing of all this upon
this dreadful place, and upon Mabel? I'll admit that there is this
atmosphere--this--er--inexplicable horror in the house and grounds, and
that if not of damnation exactly, it is certainly damnable. I'm not too
prejudiced to deny that, for I've felt it myself."
To my relief she was brief. She made her statement, leaving me to take
it or reject it as I would.
"The thought and belief its former occupants--have left behind.
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