"I think," the other went on, ignoring the interruption, "that it will be best for you to call on her this afternoon at exercise hour. She is likely to be at home then, and it will be rather early for other visitors."
Maurice struggled with himself, endeavoring to shake off the influence which this man always exercised over him. He determined to speak, and to decline the hateful errand.
"Father Frontford," he said with an effort, "I cannot undertake this."
"My son," the other responded with gentle severity, "you forget that this is a silent hour. Although I may speak to you on affairs concerning the church, that does not give you the right to answer irrelevantly."
"It is not irrelevantly," Maurice protested, feeling his growing irritation strengthen his resolve. "I"—
The voice of the old priest was more stern as he interrupted.
"You seem to forget entirely your vow of obedience. There is little merit," he added, his tone softening persuasively, "in service which is easy and pleasant. It is in the sacrifice of self and our own inclinations that we gain the conquest of self. Go, my son, and pray to be forgiven for pride and insubordination. Do you think that you would be objecting if it were not for the wound to your vanity which this work inflicts? You may repeat ten paters for having violated the rule of silence."
Maurice moved away, feeling that he dared not trust himself to speak again. To be thus treated like a willful child galled his pride and quickened all the obstinacy of his nature.
"The rule of silence!" he said to himself angrily as he went. "Are we in the Middle Ages?"
It came to him as a sort of jeer from an outside intelligence that after all they were trying to ape mediaeval discipline. He had been for weeks coming to the point where the whole monastic life seemed to him fantastic and theatrical; and now that his personal liberty was so sharply assailed, his self-respect so threatened, he was prepared to see everything in the most unfavorable light. He laughed bitterly in his mind at the tangle he was in, and contempt for himself and for the community took hold of his very soul.