"In any case he is your foster-brother. I should like you to meet him."
"Does he know the story?"
"He does."
"And is prepared to welcome me as a brother?" said Brian, with a bitter but agitated laugh. "Where is he? I will see him if you like."
He had risen to his feet, and stood with his arms crossed, his brow knitted, his mouth firmly set. There was something hard in his face, something defiant in his attitude, which caused the Prior to add a word of remonstrance. "It is not his fault," he said, "any more than it is yours. You need not be enemies; it is my object to make you friends."
"Let me see him," repeated Brian gloomily. "I do not wish to be his enemy. I do not promise to be his friend." |
"I will send him to you," said the Prior. "Wait here till he comes."
He left Brian alone; and the young man, thinking it likely that | he would be undisturbed for sometime to come, bent his face upon his hands, and tried to [missing word] his position. The strange tangle of circumstances in which he found himself involved would never be easy of adjustment; he wished with all his heart that he had refused the Prior's offer to make his foster-brother known to him, but it was too late now. Was it too late? Could he not send for Padre Cristoforo, and beg him to leave the Italian peasant in his own quiet home, ignorant of Brian's visit to the place where he was born? He would do it; and then he would leave San Stefano for ever; it was not yet too late.
He lifted up his head and rose to his feet. He was not alone in the room. To his surprise he saw before him his friend, Dino.
"You have come from Padre Cristoforo, have you?" said Brian, quickly and impetuously. He took no notice of the young man's manifest agitation and discomfort, which would have been clear to anybody less pre-occupied than Brian, at that moment. "Tell him from me that there is no need for me to see the man that he spoke of—that I do not wish to meet him. He will understand what I mean."