"I will have masses said for her soul. May I?" she added timidly.
This brought a faint blush into the monk's cheek, and moistened his cold blue eye. It came so suddenly from one he was just rating so low.
"It is a gracious thought," he said. "Do as thou wilt: often such acts fall back on the doer like blessed dew. I am thy confessor; not hers; thine is the soul I must now do my all to save, or woe be to my own. My daughter, my dear daughter, I see good and ill angels fighting for thy soul this day, ay, this moment; oh, fight thou on thine own side. Doth thou remember all I bade thee?"
"Remember!" said the princess. "Sweet saint, each syllable of thine is graved in my heart."
"But one word more then. Pray much to Christ, and little to his saints."
"And that is the best word I have light to say to thee. So part we on it. Thou to the place becomes thee best, thy father's house: I to my holy mother's work."
"Adieu," faltered the princess. "Adieu thou that I have loved too well, hated too ill, known and revered too late; forgiving angel adieu—for ever."
The monk caught her words, though but faltered in a sigh.
"FOR EVER?" he cried aloud with sudden ardour. "Christians live 'FOR EVER,' and love 'FOR EVER,' but they never part 'FOR EVER.' They part, as part the earth and sun, to meet more brightly in a little while. You and I part here for life. And what is our life? One line in the great story of the Church, whose son and daughter we are; one handful in the sand of time, one drop in the ocean of 'FOR EVER.' Adieu—for the little moment called 'a life!' We part in trouble, we shall meet in peace: we part creatures of clay, we shall meet immortal spirits: we part in a world of sin and sorrow, we shall meet where all is purity and love divine; where no ill passions are, but Christ is, and his saints around him clad in white. There, in the turning of an hour-glass, in the breaking of a bubble, in the passing of a cloud, she, and thou, and I, shall meet again; and sit at the feet of angels and archangels, apostles and saints, and beam like them with joy unspeakable, in the light of the shadow of God upon his throne, FOR EVER—AND EVER—AND EVER."