He sat down facing her, but he did not answer. His voice had deserted him, and his ideas had vexatiously scattered like frightened wild geese. He looked at her, beautiful, witching, full of smiles; then without knowing exactly why he did so, he turned and looked again at the Lucretia. Berenice laughed frankly.
"Are you comparing us?" she asked gayly. "Or are you trying to decide what I would have done in her case? I can tell you that."
"What would you have done?"
"Done? I would have run away from him and the convent both! Do you think I was made to be cooped up in a nunnery if I could escape?"
"No," he answered with fervor, "you were certainly not made for that."
"That is an unclerical answer from a monk."
"I am not a monk."
She put her head a little on one side with delicious coquetry.
"Would it be rude to ask what you are, then?"
He regarded her a moment, and then with explosive vehemence he broke out:--
"I am a deacon who has not taken the vows, and I am a man who loves you with his whole soul!"
She paled, and then flushed to her temples. She cast her eyes down, and seemed to be struggling for self-control. He did not offer to touch her, although his throat contracted with the intensity of his effort to maintain his outward calm. Then she looked up with a smile light and cold.
"We are not called upon to play Filippo and Lucretia in reversed parts," she said. "I am not trying to tempt you away from your calling.
Wouldn"t it be better to talk about the weather?"
He was unable to answer her, but sat staring with hot eyes into her face, feeling its beauty like a pain.
"It has been very cold for the season during the past week," she went on.
"Miss Morison," he retorted hotly, "I had no right to say that, but you needn"t insult me. It is cruel enough as it is."
Her face softened a little, but she ignored his words.
"Tell me," she remarked, as if more personal subjects had not come into the conversation, "what are the chances of the election? I hear so many things said that I have ceased to have any clear ideas on the subject at all."
Maurice sat upright, throwing back his shoulders. This girl should not get the better of him. He lifted his head, his nostrils distending.
"It is too soon to speak with certainty," he responded; "but it is in regard to that that I came--that I was sent to see you this afternoon.
We are under vows of obedience at the Clergy House."
He said this defiantly, fancying he saw in her face a smile at the idea of his servitude.
"You will regard what I say as the words of a messenger."
"All?" she interrupted.
He flushed with confusion, but he was determined that he would not again lose control of himself.
"All that I _shall_ say," he responded. "What I have said is to be forgotten."
"By me or by you?" she asked, dimpling into a smile so provoking that he had to look away from her or he should have given in.
"By you," was his reply; but he could not help adding under his breath: "If you wish to forget it."
She laughed outright.
"I will consider the matter. But this errand from the powers that be at the Clergy House; I am curious about that."
"You will remember," he urged, his face falling, "that it is only a message for which I have no responsibility."
"Certainly; although you would of course bring no message of which you didn"t approve."
"I am not asked whether I approve or disapprove. It is the decision of the Father Superior that it should be said; and that is the whole of it."
"Well," she inquired, as he paused, unable to go on, "after this tremendous preamble, what is it?"
It seemed to Maurice that he could not say it; but he cleared his throat, and forced himself to look her in the face.
"It has to do with your inheritance of the--your inheritance through Mrs. Frostwinch."
"My inheritance? What do you mean?" she demanded, suddenly becoming grave.
As briefly as possible he explained to her the errand which had been given to him. He could see indignation gathering in her look.
"But who has told Father Frontford that Mrs. Frostwinch is so ill?" she broke out at last. "Cousin Anna is not so well since she came from the South, but that is all. It is shameful to be speculating on her death and disposing of her property as if she were buried already! I wonder at you!"
Wynne smiled bitterly.
"I have already said that I had nothing whatever to do with the matter," he answered.
"You had no right to come to me with such a message. It puts me in the position of waiting for her death! Oh, it"s an insult! It"s an insult to me and to Cousin Anna! What will she think?"
"She will think nothing," he said, roused by a sense of her injustice, "because she will never know."
"Why will she not?"
"Because if it is cruel for me to say a thing which harms n.o.body except me for bringing the message, it would be a thousand times more cruel for you to tell your cousin that her death was counted on."
He rose as he spoke, and stood looking down on her with the full purpose of constraining her to his will. She sprang up in her turn.
"Very well; I will not tell her. You may say to Father Frontford from me that it will be time enough for him to undertake the disposal of my property when it is mine. I thank him for his officiousness!"
"You are unjust to Father Frontford. I have made his wish seem offensive by the way I have put it, I suppose. At any rate, he is simply seeking the good of the church."
"And to have himself made bishop."
"He would vote to-morrow for any man that he thought would do better than he can do. He would support Mr. Strathmore himself if he believed it well for the church. I do not find myself in sympathy with everything that he does, but I know him, and of one thing I am sure: he would be burned alive in slow fires to advance the good of the church."