"Can this be true?" we asked in perplexity.
"It is indeed," laughed Delormais. "So you see I cannot be made a bishop, for I am one already; though not duly enthroned. You will have to be present at that ceremony. I am not surprised. I knew it was coming, though I could not tell the exact day and hour. It reached me only this evening. And you are the first to whom I have told it."
"Then," we replied, rising and making him a profound bow, "let us be the first to greet you by your title, Monseigneur. The first to wish you all honour and success in that high office Heaven has destined you to fill."
"Nay," he returned; "Monseigneur to others it may be; but to you it shall be ever mon ami. For with your permission I intend our acquaintance to ripen into friendship. You shall come and visit the old Bishop in his palace. We will make it a shining light together. The oftener you come, the longer you stay, the more welcome you will be. You know that X. is surrounded by antiquities, endless monuments of interest. Amidst these attractions you will feel at home. Your visits will not be a mere sacrifice to friendship."
"You are sketching a delightful picture. Will it ever be realised?"
"That only depends upon yourself," laughed Delormais. "The Bishop has not to be made, nor the palace to be built; the guest-chamber awaits you with the blue skies and balmy airs of spring. Of all appointments it is the one I would have chosen. A life of activity, of responsibility and usefulness; a wide sphere of action; opportunities for doing much good in public, still more in private. The latter brings the greater blessing."
"You are a wonderful man," we could not help exclaiming. "Your life ought to be written. We should love to make it known to the world."
"You shall become my biographer," laughed Delormais, "if you will undertake it in French. Do what you will with what I have told you to-night. Only keep to yourself all my ecclesiastical history. That is sacred and private, at any rate as long as I am living. For the rest, change names and dates only sufficiently to prevent recognition. Not that it would matter. My life is my own, as I have said. And not that I have anything to conceal. My faults, follies and indiscretions have been those of impulse; of the head, not of the heart, I would fain believe. I cannot remember the time when I did not at least wish to do well. Of evil men and deliberate sin I have ever had a wholesome horror. But all and everything by God's grace, not of my own strength."
At that moment we were startled by a cry in the street: the well-known call of El sereno.
"Another watchman," cried Delormais. "What is the hour?"