"Comme il faut?" suggested Fanny.
"Well," answered he, smiling, "that was not exactly the expression I was looking for; but still, you understand what I mean."
"Perfectly!" said Fanny, laughing, as she took the cup of chocolate which Madeleine had poured out for her.
"I am sorry to say I took up a false position with regard to the dean, which led to many annoyances until I learnt to know him; then everything smoothed itself down so nicely that, if I may venture to say so, the relations between us became almost that of father and son. He is an extraordinary man," repeated the chaplain several times.
"Yes, is he not?" said Fanny. "I think he is the nicest clergyman I have ever seen; and if one did not understand a word of his sermon, it would still be most edifying only to hear him read the service. Then the charming poems he writes!"
"Yes. For my part, I consider his last poem, 'Peace and Reconciliation,' the best thing of the kind that has appeared in our literature for the last ten years. Can you imagine anything more charming than the lines--
"'I sat, in silent peace of even,
On humble bench before my cot'?"
"Was he poor once?" asked Madeleine, quickly.
Fanny laughed; but the chaplain explained, in a clear and good-natured way, that the poem had been written after Sparre had become dean, and that the cottage was merely a poetical way of expressing his great simplicity.
Madeleine felt that she had asked a foolish question, and went to the window and looked out into the street.