“A friar? Then you are not his confessor? Yet you know all. That gentle voice!”
She raised her head slowly, and peered at him through her mask.
The next moment she uttered a faint shriek, and lay with her brow upon his bare feet.
CHAPTER LXXV
Clement sighed. He began to doubt whether he had taken the wisest course with a creature so passionate.
But young as he was, he had already learned many lessons of ecclesiastical wisdom. For one thing he had been taught to pause, ie., in certain difficulties, neither to do nor to say anything, until the matter should clear itself a little.
He therefore held his peace and prayed for wisdom.
All he did was gently to withdraw his foot.
But his penitent flung her arms round it with a piteous cry, and held it convulsively, and wept over it.