The Queen of Hearts

by Wilkie Collins

  CHAPTER V.

  I HAD settled it in my own mind that we had better make the town ofFondi, close on the frontier, our headquarters, to begin with, and Ihad arranged, with the assistance of the embassy, that the leaden coffinshould follow us so far, securely nailed up in its packing-case. Besidesour passports, we were well furnished with letters of introduction tothe local authorities at most of the important frontier towns, and, tocrown all, we had money enough at our command (thanks to Monkton'svast fortune) to make sure of the services of any one whom we wanted toassist us all along our line of search. These various resources insuredus every facility for action, provided always that we succeeded indiscovering the body of the dead duelist. But, in the very probableevent of our failing to do this, our future prospects--more especiallyafter the responsibility I had undertaken--were of anything but anagreeable nature to contemplate. I confess I felt uneasy, almosthopeless, as we posted, in the dazzling Italian sunshine, along the roadto Fondi.

  We made an easy two days' journey of it; for I had insisted, onMonkton's account, that we should travel slowly.

  On the first day the excessive agitation of my companion a littlealarmed me; he showed, in many ways, more symptoms of a disordered mindthan I had yet observed in him. On the second day, however, he seemed toget accustomed to contemplate calmly the new idea of the search on whichwe were bent, and, except on one point, he was cheerful and composedenough. Whenever his dead uncle formed the subject of conversation,he still persisted--on the strength of the old prophecy, and under theinfluence of the apparition which he saw, or thought he saw always--inasserting that the corpse of Stephen Monkton, wherever it was, layyet unburied. On every other topic he deferred to me with the utmostreadiness and docility; on this he maintained his strange opinion withan obstinacy which set reason and persuasion alike at defiance.

  On the third day we rested at Fondi. The packing-case, with the coffinin it, reached us, and was deposited in a safe place under lock andkey. We engaged some mules, and found a man to act as guide who knewthe country thoroughly. It occurred to me that we had better begin byconfiding the real object of our journey only to the most trustworthypeople we could find among the better-educated classes. For this reasonwe followed, in one respect, the example of the fatal dueling-party, bystarting, early on the morning of the fourth day, with sketch-books andcolor-boxes, as if we were only artists in search of the picturesque.

  After traveling some hours in a northerly direction within the Romanfrontier, we halted to rest ourselves and our mules at a wild littlevillage far out of the track of tourists in general.

  The only person of the smallest importance in the place was the priest,and to him I addressed my first inquiries, leaving Monkton to await myreturn with the guide. I spoke Italian quite fluently, and correctlyenough for my purpose, and was extremely polite and cautious inintroducing my business, but in spite of all the pains I took, I onlysucceeded in frightening and bewildering the poor priest more and morewith every fresh word I said to him. The idea of a dueling-party and adead man seemed to scare him out of his senses. He bowed, fidgeted, casthis eyes up to heaven, and piteously shrugging his shoulders, told me,with rapid Italian circumlocution, that he had not the faintest ideaof what I was talking about. This was my first failure. I confess I wasweak enough to feel a little dispirited when I rejoined Monkton and theguide.

  After the heat of the day was over we resumed our journey.

  About three miles from the village, the road, or rather cart-track,branched off in two directions. The path to the right, our guideinformed us, led up among the mountains to a convent about six milesoff. If we penetrated beyond the convent we should soon reach theNeapolitan frontier. The path to the left led far inward on the Romanterritory, and would conduct us to a small town where we could sleep forthe night. Now the Roman territory presented the first and fittest fieldfor our search, and the convent was always within reach, supposing wereturned to Fondi unsuccessful. Besides, the path to the left led overthe widest part of the country we were starting to explore, and I wasalways for vanquishing the greatest difficulty first; so we decidedmanfully on turning to the left. The expedition in which this resolutioninvolved us lasted a whole week, and produced no results. We discoveredabsolutely nothing, and returned to our headquarters at Fondi socompletely baffled that we did not know whither to turn our steps next.

  I was made much more uneasy by the effect of our failure on Monkton thanby the failure itself. His resolution appeared to break down altogetheras soon as we began to retrace our steps.

  He became first fretful and capricious, then silent and desponding.Finally, he sank into a lethargy of body and mind that seriouslyalarmed me. On the morning after our return to Fondi he showed a strangetendency to sleep incessantly, which made me suspect the existence ofsome physical malady in his brain. The whole day he hardly exchangeda word with me, and seemed to be never fairly awake. Early the nextmorning I went into his room, and found him as silent and lethargic asever. His servant, who was with us, informed me that Alfred had once ortwice before exhibited such physical symptoms of mental exhaustion aswe were now observing during his father's lifetime at Wincot Abbey.This piece of information made me feel easier, and left my mind free toreturn to the consideration of the errand which had brought us to Fondi.

  I resolved to occupy the time until my companion got better inprosecuting our search by myself. That path to the right hand which ledto the convent had not yet been explored. If I set off to trace it, Ineed not be away from Monkton more than one night, and I should at leastbe able, on my return, to give him the satisfaction of knowing that onemore uncertainty regarding the place of the duel had been cleared up.These considerations decided me. I left a message for my friend in casehe asked where I had gone, and set out once more for the village atwhich we had halted when starting on our first expedition.

  Intending to walk to the convent, I parted company with the guide andthe mules where the track branched off, leaving them to go back to thevillage and await my return.

  For the first four miles the path gently ascended through an opencountry, then became abruptly much steeper, and led me deeper and deeperamong thickets and endless woods. By the time my watch informed me thatI must have nearly walked my appointed distance, the view was bounded onall sides and the sky was shut out overhead by an impervious screen ofleaves and branches. I still followed my only guide, the steep path; andin ten minutes, emerging suddenly on a plot of tolerably clear and levelground, I saw the convent before me.

  It was a dark, low, sinister-looking place. Not a sign of life ormovement was visible anywhere about it. Green stains streaked the oncewhite facade of the chapel in all directions. Moss clustered thick inevery crevice of the heavy scowling wall that surrounded the convent.Long lank weeds grew out of the fissures of roof and parapet, and,drooping far downward, waved wearily in and out of the barred dormitorywindows. The very cross opposite the entrance-gate, with a shockinglife-sized figure in wood nailed to it, was so beset at the base withcrawling creatures, and looked so slimy, green, and rotten all the wayup, that I absolutely shrank from it.

  A bell-rope with a broken handle hung by the gate. I approachedit--hesitated, I hardly knew why--looked up at the convent again, andthen walked round to the back of the building, partly to gain timeto consider what I had better do next, partly from an unaccountablecuriosity that urged me, strangely to myself, to see all I could of theoutside of the place before I attempted to gain admission at the gate.

  At the back of the convent I found an outhouse, built on to the wall--aclumsy, decayed building, with the greater part of the roof fallen in,and with a jagged hole in one of its sides, where in all probability awindow had once been. Behind the outhouse the trees grew thicker thanever. As I looked toward them I could not determine whether the groundbeyond me rose or fell--whether it was grassy, or earthy, or rocky. Icould see nothing but the all-pervading leaves, brambles, ferns, andlong grass.

  Not a sound broke the oppressive stillness
. No bird's note rose from theleafy wilderness around me; no voices spoke in the convent garden behindthe scowling wall; no clock struck in the chapel-tower; no dog barked inthe ruined outhouse. The dead silence deepened the solitude of the placeinexpressibly. I began to feel it weighing on my spirits--the more,because woods were never favorite places with me to walk in. The sort ofpastoral happiness which poets often represent when they sing of life inthe woods never, to my mind, has half the charm of life on the mountainor in the plain. When I am in a wood, I miss the boundless loveliness ofthe sky, and the delicious softness that distance gives to the earthlyview beneath. I feel oppressively the change which the free air sufferswhen it gets imprisoned among leaves, and I am always awed, rather thanpleased, by that mysterious still light which shines with such a strangedim luster in deep places among trees. It may convict me of wantof taste and absence of due feeling for the marvelous beauties ofvegetation, but I must frankly own that I never penetrate far into awood without finding that the getting out of it again is the pleasantestpart of my walk--the getting out on to the barest down, the wildesthill-side, the bleakest mountain top--the getting out anywhere, so thatI can see the sky over me and the view before me as far as my eye canreach.

  After such a confession as I have now made, it will appear surprising tono one that I should have felt the strongest possible inclination, whileI stood by the ruined outhouse, to retrace my steps at once, and makethe best of my way out of the wood. I had, indeed, actually turned todepart, when the remembrance of the errand which had brought me to theconvent suddenly stayed my feet. It seemed doubtful whether I should beadmitted into the building if I rang the bell; and more than doubtful,if I were let in, whether the inhabitants would be able to afford meany clew to the information of which I was in search. However, it was myduty to Monkton to leave no means of helping him in his desperate objectuntried; so I resolved to go round to the front of the convent again,and ring at the gate-bell at all hazards.

  By the merest chance I looked up as I passed the side of the outhousewhere the jagged hole was, and noticed that it was pierced rather highin the wall.

  As I stopped to observe this, the closeness of the atmosphere in thewood seemed to be affecting me more unpleasantly than ever.

  I waited a minute and untied my cravat.

  Closeness? surely it was something more than that. The air was evenmore distasteful to my nostrils than to my lungs. There was some faint,indescribable smell loading it--some smell of which I had never had anyprevious experience--some smell which I thought (now that my attentionwas directed to it) grew more and more certainly traceable to its sourcethe nearer I advanced to the outhouse.

  By the time I had tried the experiment two or three times, and had mademyself sure of this fact, my curiosity became excited. There were plentyof fragments of stone and brick lying about me. I gathered some of themtogether, and piled them up below the hole, then mounted to the top,and, feeling rather ashamed of what I was doing, peeped into theouthouse.

  The sight of horror that met my eyes the instant I looked through thehole is as present to my memory now as if I had beheld it yesterday. Ican hardly write of it at this distance of time without a thrill of theold terror running through me again to the heart.

  The first impression conveyed to me, as I looked in, was of a long,recumbent object, tinged with a lightish blue color all over, extendedon trestles, and bearing a certain hideous, half-formed resemblance tothe human face and figure. I looked again, and felt certain of it. Therewere the prominences of the forehead, nose, and chin, dimly shown asunder a veil--there, the round outline of the chest and the hollow belowit--there, the points of the knees, and the stiff, ghastly, upturnedfeet. I looked again, yet more attentively. My eyes got accustomed tothe dim light streaming in through the broken roof, and I satisfiedmyself, judging by the great length of the body from head to foot, thatI was looking at the corpse of a man--a corpse that had apparently oncehad a sheet spread over it, and that had lain rotting on the trestlesunder the open sky long enough for the linen to take the livid,light-blue tinge of mildew and decay which now covered it.

  How long I remained with my eyes fixed on that dread sight of death, onthat tombless, terrible wreck of humanity, poisoning the still air, andseeming even to stain the faint descending light that disclosed it, Iknow not. I remember a dull, distant sound among the trees, as if thebreeze were rising--the slow creeping on of the sound to near the placewhere I stood--the noiseless whirling fall of a dead leaf on the corpsebelow me, through the gap in the outhouse roof--and the effect ofawakening my energies, of relaxing the heavy strain on my mind, whicheven the slight change wrought in the scene I beheld by the falling leafproduced in me immediately. I descended to the ground, and, sitting downon the heap of stones, wiped away the thick perspiration which coveredmy face, and which I now became aware of for the first time. It wassomething more than the hideous spectacle unexpectedly offered to myeyes which had shaken my nerves as I felt that they were shaken now.Monkton's prediction that, if we succeeded in discovering his uncle'sbody, we should find it unburied, recurred to me the instant I saw thetrestles and their ghastly burden. I felt assured on the instant thatI had found the dead man--the old prophecy recurred to my memory--astrange yearning sorrow, a vague foreboding of ill, an inexplicableterror, as I thought of the poor lad who was awaiting my return in thedistant town, struck through me with a chill of superstitious dread,robbed me of my judgment and resolution, and left me when I had at lastrecovered myself, weak and dizzy, as if I had just suffered under somepang of overpowering physical pain.

  I hastened round to the convent gate and rang impatiently at thebell--waited a little while and rang again--then heard footsteps.

  In the middle of the gate, just opposite my face, there was a smallsliding panel, not more than a few inches long; this was presentlypushed aside from within. I saw, through a bit of iron grating, twodull, light gray eyes staring vacantly at me, and heard a feeble huskyvoice saying:

  "What may you please to want?'

  "I am a traveler--" I began.

  "We live in a miserable place. We have nothing to show travelers here."

  "I don't come to see anything. I have an important question to ask,which I believe some one in this convent will be able to answer. If youare not willing to let me in, at least come out and speak to me here."

  "Are you alone?"

  "Quite alone."

  "Are there no women with you?"

  "None."

  The gate was slowly unbarred, and an old Capuchin, very infirm, verysuspicious, and very dirty, stood before me. I was far too excited andimpatient to waste any time in prefatory phrases; so, telling the monkat once how I had looked through the hole in the outhouse, and what Ihad seen inside, I asked him, in plain terms, who the man had been whosecorpse I had beheld, and why the body was left unburied?

  The old Capuchin listened to me with watery eyes that twinkledsuspiciously. He had a battered tin snuff-box in his hand, and hisfinger and thumb slowly chased a few scattered grains of snuff roundand round the inside of the box all the time I was speaking. When I haddone, he shook his head and said: "That was certainly an ugly sight intheir outhouse; one of the ugliest sights, he felt sure, that ever I hadseen in all my life!"

  "I don't want to talk of the sight," I rejoined, impatiently; "I wantto know who the man was, how he died, and why he is not decently buried.Can you tell me?"

  The monk's finger and thumb having captured three or four grains ofsnuff at last, he slowly drew them into his nostrils, holding the boxopen under his nose the while, to prevent the possibility of wastingeven one grain, sniffed once or twice luxuriously--closed thebox--then looked at me again with his eyes watering and twinkling moresuspiciously than before.

  "Yes," said the monk, "that's an ugly sight in our outhouse--a very uglysight, certainly!"

  I never had more difficulty in keeping my temper in my life than atthat moment. I succeeded, however, in repressing a very disrespectfulexpression on the su
bject of monks in general, which was on the tipof my tongue, and made another attempt to conquer the old man'sexasperating reserve. Fortunately for my chances of succeeding with him,I was a snuff-taker myself, and I had a box full of excellent Englishsnuff in my pocket, which I now produced as a bribe. It was my lastresource.

  "I thought your box seemed empty just now," said I; "will you try apinch out of mine?"

  The offer was accepted with an almost youthful alacrity of gesture. TheCapuchin took the largest pinch I ever saw held between any man's fingerand thumb--inhaled it slowly without spilling a single grain--halfclosed his eyes--and, wagging his head gently, patted me paternally onthe back.

  "Oh, my son," said the monk, "what delectable snuff! Oh, my son andamiable traveler, give the spiritual father who loves you yet anothertiny, tiny pinch!"

  "Let me fill your box for you. I shall have plenty left for myself."

  The battered tin snuff-box was given to me before I had done speaking;the paternal hand patted my back more approvingly than ever; the feeble,husky voice grew glib and eloquent in my praise. I had evidently foundout the weak side of the old Capuchin, and, on returning him his box, Itook instant advantage of the discovery.

  "Excuse my troubling you on the subject again," I said, "but I haveparticular reasons for wanting to hear all that you can tell me inexplanation of that horrible sight in the outhouse."

  "Come in," answered the monk.

  He drew me inside the gate, closed it, and then leading the way across agrass-grown courtyard, looking out on a weedy kitchen-garden, showedme into a long room with a low ceiling, a dirty dresser, a fewrudely-carved stall seats, and one or two grim, mildewed pictures forornaments. This was the sacristy.

  "There's nobody here, and it's nice and cool," said the old Capuchin.It was so damp that I actually shivered. "Would you like to see thechurch?" said the monk; "a jewel of a church, if we could keep it inrepair; but we can't. Ah! malediction and misery, we are too poor tokeep our church in repair!"

  Here he shook his head and began fumbling with a large bunch of keys.

  "Never mind the church now," said I. "Can you, or can you not, tell mewhat I want to know?"

  "Everything, from beginning to end--absolutely everything. Why, Ianswered the gate-bell--I always answer the gate-bell here," said theCapuchin.

  "What, in Heaven's name, has the gate-bell to do with the unburiedcorpse in your house?"

  "Listen, son of mine, and you shall know. Some time ago--somemonths--ah! me, I'm old; I've lost my memory; I don't know how manymonths--ah! miserable me, what a very old, old monk I am!" Here hecomforted himself with another pinch of snuff.

  "Never mind the exact time," said I. "I don't care about that."

  "Good," said the Capuchin. "Now I can go on. Well, let us say it is somemonths ago--we in this convent are all at breakfast--wretched, wretchedbreakfasts, son of mine, in this convent!--we are at breakfast, and wehear _bang! bang!_ twice over. 'Guns,' says I. 'What are they shootingfor?' says Brother Jeremy. 'Game,' says Brother Vincent. 'Aha! game,'says Brother Jeremy. 'If I hear more, I shall send out and discover whatit means,' says the father superior. We hear no more, and we go on withour wretched breakfasts."

  "Where did the report of firearms come from?" I inquired.

  "From down below--beyond the big trees at the back of the convent, wherethere's some clear ground--nice ground, if it wasn't for the pools andpuddles. But, ah! misery, how damp we are in these parts! how very, verydamp!"

  "Well, what happened after the report of firearms?"

  "You shall hear. We are still at breakfast, all silent--for what have weto talk about here? What have we but our devotions, our kitchen-garden,and our wretched, wretched bits of breakfasts and dinners? I say we areall silent, when there comes suddenly such a ring at the bell as neverwas heard before--a very devil of a ring--a ring that caught us all withour bits--our wretched, wretched bits!--in our mouths, and stopped usbefore we could swallow them. 'Go, brother of mine,' says the fathersuperior to me, 'go; it is your duty--go to the gate.' I am brave--avery lion of a Capuchin. I slip out on tiptoe--I wait--I listen--I pullback our little shutter in the gate--I wait, I listen again--I peepthrough the hole--nothing, absolutely nothing that I can see. I ambrave--I am not to be daunted. What do I do next? I open the gate. Ah!sacred Mother of Heaven, what do I behold lying all along our threshold?A man--dead!--a big man; bigger than you, bigger than me, bigger thananybody in this convent--buttoned up tight in a fine coat, with blackeyes, staring, staring up at the sky, and blood soaking through andthrough the front of his shirt. What do I do? I scream once--I screamtwice--and run back to the father superior!"

  All the particulars of the fatal duel which I had gleaned from theFrench newspaper in Monkton's room at Naples recurred vividly to mymemory. The suspicion that I had felt when I looked into the outhousebecame a certainty as I listened to the old monk's last words.

  "So far I understand," said I. "The corpse I have just seen in theouthouse is the corpse of the man whom you found dead outside your gate.Now tell me why you have not given the remains decent burial."

  "Wait--wait--wait," answered the Capuchin. "The father superior hearsme scream and comes out; we all run together to the gate; we lift up thebig man and look at him close. Dead! dead as this (smacking the dresserwith his hand). We look again, and see a bit of paper pinned to thecollar of his coat. Aha! son of mine, you start at that. I thought Ishould make you start at last."

  I had started, indeed. That paper was doubtless the leaf mentionedin the second's unfinished narrative as having been torn out of hispocketbook, and inscribed with the statement of how the dead man hadlost his life. If proof positive were wanted to identify the dead body,here was such proof found.

  "What do you think was written on the bit of paper?" continued theCapuchin "We read and shudder. This dead man has been killed in aduel--he, the desperate, the miserable, has died in the commission ofmortal sin; and the men who saw the killing of him ask us Capuchins,holy men, servants of Heaven, children of our lord the Pope--they ask_us_ to give him burial! Oh! but we are outraged when we read that; wegroan, we wring our hands, we turn away, we tear our beards, we--"

  "Wait one moment," said I, seeing that the old man was heating himselfwith his narrative, and was likely, unless I stopped him, to talk moreand more fluently to less and less purpose--"wait a moment. Have youpreserved the paper that was pinned to the dead man's coat; and can Ilook at it?"

  The Capuchin seemed on the point of giving me an answer, when hesuddenly checked himself. I saw his eyes wander away from my face, andat the same moment heard a door softly opened and closed again behindme.

  Looking round immediately, I observed another monk in the sacristy--atall, lean, black-bearded man, in whose presence my old friend with thesnuff-box suddenly became quite decorous and devotional to look at. Isuspected I was in the presence of the father superior, and I found thatI was right the moment he addressed me.

  "I am the father superior of this convent," he said, in quiet, cleartones, and looking me straight in the face while he spoke, with coldlyattentive eyes. "I have heard the latter part of your conversation, andI wish to know why you are so particularly anxious to see the piece ofpaper that was pinned to the dead man's coat?"

  The coolness with which he avowed that he had been listening, and thequietly imperative manner in which he put his concluding question,perplexed and startled me. I hardly knew at first what tone I ought totake in answering him. He observed my hesitation, and attributing it tothe wrong cause, signed to the old Capuchin to retire. Humbly strokinghis long gray beard, and furtively consoling himself with a privatepinch of the "delectable snuff," my venerable friend shuffled out ofthe room, making a profound obeisance at the door just before hedisappeared.

  "Now," said the father superior, as coldly as ever, "I am waiting, sir,for your reply."

  "You shall have it in the fewest possible words," said I, answering himin his own tone. "I find, to my disgust and horror, that there
is anunburied corpse in an outhouse attached to your convent. I believe thatcorpse to be the body of an English gentleman of rank and fortune, whowas killed in a duel. I have come into this neighborhood with thenephew and only relation of the slain man, for the express purpose ofrecovering his remains; and I wish to see the paper found on the body,because I believe that paper will identify it to the satisfaction ofthe relative to whom I have referred. Do you find my reply sufficientlystraightforward? And do you mean to give me permission to look at thepaper?"

  "I am satisfied with your reply, and see no reason for refusing you asight of the paper," said the father superior; "but I have something tosay first. In speaking of the impression produced on you by beholdingthe corpse, you used the words 'disgust' and 'horror.' This licenseof expression in relation to what you have seen in the precincts of aconvent proves to me that you are out of the pale of the Holy CatholicChurch. You have no right, therefore, to expect any explanation; butI will give you one, nevertheless, as a favor. The slain man died,unabsolved, in the commission of mortal sin. We infer so much from thepaper which we found on his body; and we know, by the evidence of ourown eyes and ears, that he was killed on the territories of the Church,and in the act of committing direct violation of those special lawsagainst the crime of dueling, the strict enforcement of which the holyfather himself has urged on the faithful throughout his dominions byletters signed with his own hand. Inside this convent the ground isconsecrated, and we Catholics are not accustomed to bury the outlaws ofour religion, the enemies of our holy father, and the violators of ourmost sacred laws in consecrated ground. Outside this convent we have norights and no power; and, if we had both, we should remember that we aremonks, not grave-diggers, and that the only burial with which _we_ canhave any concern is burial with the prayers of the Church. That is allthe explanation I think it necessary to give. Wait for me here, and youshall see the paper." With those words the father superior left the roomas quietly as he had entered it.

  I had hardly time to think over this bitter and ungracious explanation,and to feel a little piqued by the language and manner of the person whohad given it to me, before the father superior returned with thepaper in his hand. He placed it before me on the dresser, and I read,hurriedly traced in pencil, the following lines:

  "This paper is attached to the body of the late Mr. Stephen Monkton, anEnglishman of distinction. He has been shot in a duel, conducted withperfect gallantry and honor on both sides. His body is placed at thedoor of this convent, to receive burial at the hands of its inmates, thesurvivors of the encounter being obliged to separate and secure theirsafety by immediate flight. I, the second of the slain man, and thewriter of this explanation, certify, on my word of honor as a gentlemanthat the shot which killed my principal on the instant was fired fairly,in the strictest accordance with the rules laid down beforehand for theconduct of the duel.

  "(Signed), F."

  "F." I recognized easily enough as the initial letter of MonsieurFoulon's name, the second of Mr. Monkton, who had died of consumption atParis.

  The discovery and the identification were now complete. Nothing remainedbut to break the news to Alfred, and to get permission to remove theremains in the outhouse. I began almost to doubt the evidence of my ownsenses when I reflected that the apparently impracticable object withwhich we had left Naples was already, by the merest chance, virtuallyaccomplished.

  "The evidence of the paper is decisive," said I, handing it back. "Therecan be no doubt that the remains in the outhouse are the remains ofwhich we have been in search. May I inquire if any obstacles will bethrown in our way should the late Mr. Monkton's nephew wish to removehis uncle's body to the family burial-place in England?"

  "Where is this nephew?" asked the father superior.

  "He is now awaiting my return at the town of Fondi."

  "Is he in a position to prove his relationship?"

  "Certainly; he has papers with him which will place it beyond a doubt."

  "Let him satisfy the civil authorities of his claim, and he need expectno obstacle to his wishes from any one here."

  I was in no humor for talking a moment longer with my sour-temperedcompanion than I could help. The day was wearing on me fast; and,whether night overtook me or not, I was resolved never to stop on myreturn till I got back to Fondi. Accordingly, after telling the fathersuperior that he might expect to hear from me again immediately, I mademy bow and hastened out of the sacristy.

  At the convent gate stood my old friend with the tin snuff-box, waitingto let me out.

  "Bless you, may son," said the venerable recluse, giving me a farewellpat on the shoulder, "come back soon to your spiritual father wholoves you, and amiably favor him with another tiny, tiny pinch of thedelectable snuff."