He took her hand again and now in silence they walked forward noiselessly over the thick leaf-carpet on the pavement of rare marble.
"Oh, Allan, I feel so very small in here!" she whispered, drawing close to him. "You and I, all alone in this tremendous place built for thousands--"
"You and I are the world to-day!" he answered very gravely; and so together they made way toward the vast transept, arched with a bewildering lacery of vaultings.
All save the concrete had long vanished. No traces now remained of pews, or railings, altars, pulpits, or any of the fittings of the vast cathedral.
Majestic in its naked strength, the building stood in light and shadow, here banded with strong sun, there lost in cool purple shade that foiled the eye far up among the hanging miracles of the roof.
At the transept-crossing they stood amazed; for here the flutings ran up five hundred feet inside the stupendous central spire, among a marvelous filigree of windows which diminished toward the top--a lacework as of frost-patterns etched into the solid substance of the fleche.
"Higher than that, more massive and more beautiful the buildings of the future shall arise," said Allan slowly after a pause. "But they shall not serve creed or faction. They shall be for all mankind, for the great race still to come. Beauty shall be its heritage, its right.
"'And loveliness shall crown the waiting world As with a garland of immortal joy!'
"But come, come, Beatrice--there's work to do. The records, girl! We mustn't stand here admiring architecture and dreaming dreams while those records are still undiscovered. Down into the crypt we go, to dig among the relics of a vanished age!"
"The crypt, Allan? Where is it?"
"If I remember rightly--and at the time this cathedral was built I followed the plans with some care--the entrance is back of the main southern cluster of pillars over there at the transept-crossing. Come on, Beta. In a minute we can see whether thousand-year-old memories are any good or not!"
Quickly he led the way, ax and torch in hand, and as they rounded the group of massive buttresses whence sprang the pillars for the groin-vaults aloft, a cry of satisfaction escaped him, followed by a word of quick astonishment.
"What is it, Allan?" exclaimed the girl. "Anything wrong? Or--"
The man stood peering with wide eyes; then suddenly he knelt and began pawing over the little heap of vegetable drift that had accumulated along the wall.
"It's here, all right," said he. "There's the door, right in front of us--but what I don't understand is--this!"