* * * * *
Half an hour later he stood by his father's bed, looking down on him
without fear.
"Father," he said, as the old man stared up at him through sleep-ridden
eyes, "I have come to give you my answer. It is that I must go to Rheims
and be a priest."
Then he turned again and went out of the room, without waiting.
CHAPTER IX
I
Mrs. Manners was still abed when her daughter came in to see her. She
lay in the great chamber that gave upon the gallery above the hall
whence, on either side, she could hear whether or no the maids were at
their business--which was a comfort to her if a discomfort to them. And
now that her lord was in Derby, she lay here all alone.
The first that she knew of her daughter's coming was a light in her
eyes; and the next was a face, as of a stranger, looking at her with
great eyes, exalted by joy and pain. The light, held below, cast shadows
upwards from chin and cheek, and the eyes shone in hollows. Then, as she
sat up, she saw that it was her daughter, and that the maid held a paper
in her hands; she was in her night-linen, and a wrap lay over her
shoulders and shrouded her hair.
"He is to be a priest," she whispered sharply. "Thank our Lord with me
... and ... and God have mercy on me!"
Then Marjorie was on her knees by the bedside, sobbing so that the
curtains shook.
* * * * *
The mother got it all out of her presently--the tale of the girl's heart
torn two ways at once.
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