“I heard them, Father, if it please you. Has he left any will?”
The priest-nature in the Prior compelled him officially to avoid any reprehension of this perfect monastic calm; but the human nature, which in his case lay beneath it, was surprised and repelled.
“He has left a will, wherein you are fully provided for.”
“Oh, that is nice!” said Mother Margaret, in tones of unquestionable gratulation. “And how much am I to have? Of course I care about it only for the sake of the Abbey.”
The Prior had his private ideas on that point; for, as he well knew, the vow of poverty was somewhat of a formality in the Middle Ages, since the nun who brought to her convent a title and a fortune was usually not treated in the same manner as a penniless commoner.
“The customary dower to a widow, Sister.”
“Do you mean to say I am only to have my third? Well, I call that shameful! And so fond of me as he always professed to be! I thought he would have left me everything.”
The Prior experienced a curious sensation in his right arm, which, had Mother Margaret not been a woman, or had he been less of a Christian and a Church dignitary, might have resulted in the measuring of her length on the floor of the recreation-room. But she was totally unconscious of any such feeling on his part. Her heart—or that within her which did duty for one—had been touched at last.
“Well, I do call it disgraceful!” she repeated.
“And is that all?” asked the Prior involuntarily, and not by any means in consonance with his duty as a holy priest addressing a veiled nun. But priests and nuns have no business with hearts of any sort, and he ought to have known this as well as she did.