The Guests of Hercules | Page 4

more to see you than for any other reason. And,
besides, there's another thing. Only I hardly know how to say it, or
whether I dare say it at all."
Sister Rose looked suddenly anxious, as if she were afraid of something
that might follow. "What is it?" she asked quickly, almost sharply.
"You must tell me."
"Why, it's nothing to tell--exactly. It's only this: I'm worried. I'm glad
you're not going to be a nun all your life, dear; delighted--enchanted.
You're given back to me. But--I worry because I can't help feeling that
I've got something to do with the changing of your mind so suddenly;
that if ever you should regret anything--not that you will, but if you
should--you might blame me, hate me, perhaps."
"I never shall do either, whatever happens," the novice said, earnestly
and gravely. She did not look at her friend as she spoke, though they
were so nearly of the same height as they walked, their arms linked
together, that they could gaze straight into one another's eyes. Instead,
she looked up at the sky, through the groined gray ceiling of
tree-branches, as if offering a vow. And seeing her uplifted profile with

its pure features and clear curve of dark lashes, Peter thought how
beautiful she was, of a beauty quite unearthly, and perhaps unsuited to
the world. With a pang, she wondered if such a girl would not have
been safer forever in the convent where she had lived most of her years.
And though she herself was four years younger, she felt old and mature,
and terribly wise compared with Sister Rose. An awful sense of
responsibility was upon her. She was afraid of it. Her pretty blond face,
with its bright and shrewd gray eyes, looked almost drawn, and lost the
fresh colour that made the little golden freckles charming as the dust of
flower-pollen on her rounded cheeks.
"But I have got something to do with it, haven't I?" she persisted,
longing for contradiction, yet certain that it would not come.
"I hardly know--to be quite honest," Mary answered. "I don't know
what I might have done if you hadn't come back and told me things
about your life, and all your travels with your father--things that made
me tingle. Maybe I should never have had the courage without that
incentive. But, Peter, I'll tell you something I couldn't have told you till
to-day. Since the very beginning of my novitiate I was never happy,
never at rest."
"Truly? You wanted to go, even then, for two whole years?"
"I don't know what I wanted. But suddenly all the sweet calm was
broken. You've often looked out from the dormitory windows over the
lake, and seen how a wind springing up in an instant ruffles the clear
surface. It's just like a mirror broken into a thousand tiny fragments.
Well, it was so with me, with my spirit. And after all these years, when
I'd been so contented, so happy that I couldn't even bear, as a schoolgirl,
to go away for two or three days to visit Lady MacMillan in the
holidays, without nearly dying of homesickness before I could be
brought back! As a postulant I was just as happy, too. You know, I
wouldn't go out into the world to try my resolve, as Reverend Mother
advised. I was so sure there could be no home for me but this. Then
came the change. Oh, Peter, I hope it wasn't the legacy! I pray I'm not
so mean as that!"

"How long was it after your novitiate began that the money was left
you?" Peter asked: for this was the first intimate talk alone and
undisturbed that she had had with her old school friend since coming
back to the convent three months ago. She knew vaguely that a cousin
of Mary's dead father had left the novice money, and that it had been
unexpected, as the lady was not a Roman Catholic, and had relations
just as near, of her own religion. But Peter did not quite know when the
news had come, or what had happened then.
"It was the very next day. That was odd, wasn't it? Though I don't know,
exactly, why it should have seemed odd. It had to happen on some day.
Why not that one? I was glad I should have a good dowry--quite proud
to be of some use to the convent. I didn't think what I might have done
for myself, if I'd been in the world--not then. But afterward, thoughts
crept into my head. I used to push them out again as fast as they
crawled in, and I told myself what a good thing I had a safe refuge,
remembering my father, what he wrote about