Rosamund Grantham, after the manner of the modern generation, had yet to find herself, and suffered accordingly.
It need scarcely be added that she did not confine her sufferings to herself.
Frances, overwhelmed by the difficulties of reconciling responsiveness to Cousin Bertie’s bracing councils of self-reliance, with submission to Rosamund’s intensely protective and rather overpowering solicitude, sought more frequently than ever the soothing society of Nina Severing.
That gentle soul was passing through a period of storm of which she presently confided the outline to Frances.
“Sometimes, darling, as I sit here alone through the long evenings, I wonder if my life might have been different if I’d been a more religious woman. You see, Francie, I married very, very young. I wasn’t much older than you are now. My husband was not a man who believed in any very definite creed, and I was young enough to be altogether influenced by him.”
It was ever Nina’s custom to lay the errors and omissions of her past at the door of Geoffrey Severing and her youthful marriage.
“Should you like to be a Roman Catholic?” asked Frances suddenly.
“It’s a very beautiful religion, and of course beauty is a religion in itself, to an artist,” said Nina thoughtfully. “Why do you ask?”
“I’ve often thought,” said Frances very shyly, “that I should like it myself. It seems such a thorough-going sort of religion. When we were little, my mother had a Catholic maid—an Irish girl—and she used to tell us a lot about it. And she was so particular about not eating meat on certain days and going to Mass every Sunday. She had to walk quite a long way, but I don’t believe she ever missed going. Of course she was very superstitious, and used to want us to wear medals and charms and things, but some of the prayers she taught us were nice. My mother was a Catholic by birth, too, though she never went to church or anything.”
“If I were anything, I should certainly be a Catholic,” said Nina with extreme conviction in her tone. “It’s the only creed which appeals to me in the slightest degree. It is so beautiful—all that music and those touching ideas about the Virgin and everything.”