“Well,” said the girl confidently, “I saw her, but she got away from me. But I shall find her––it is right that I should. Now tell me, what are you going to do?”
“I have no idea. Earn my living some way,” he replied meditatively.
“You have lots of friends who will help you?”
“None,” he said sadly. “I am an apostate, you know.”
“Well, that means that you’re free. The chains have dropped, haven’t they?”
“But left me dazed and confused.”
“You are not dazed, nor confused! Why, you’re like a prisoner coming out of his dungeon into the bright sunlight. You’re only blinking, that’s all. And, as for confusion––well, if I would admit it to be true I could point to a terrible state of it! Just think, a duke wants to marry me; Mrs. Hawley-Crowles is determined that he shall; I am an Inca princess, and yet I don’t know who I am; my own people apparently are swallowed up by the war in Colombia; and I am in an environment here in New York in which I have to fight every moment to keep myself from flying all to pieces! But I guess God intends to keep me here for the present. Oh, yes, and Monsignor Lafelle insists that I am a Catholic and that I must join his Church.”
“Monsignor Lafelle! You––you know him?”
“Oh, yes, very well. And you?”
He evaded reply by another query. “Is Monsignor Lafelle working with Madam Beaubien, your friend?”