Doucebelle determined that, if she could possibly contrive it, without wounding the feelings of Father Nicholas, her next confession should be made to Father Bruno. He seemed to her to be a man made of altogether different metal from his colleagues. Master Aristoteles kept himself entirely to physical ailments, and never heard a confession, except from the sick in emergency. Father Nicholas was a very easy confessor, for his thoughts were usually in his beloved study, and whatever the confession might be, absolution seemed to follow as a matter of course. If his advice were asked on any point outside philology in all its divisions, he generally appeared to be rather taken by surprise, and almost as much puzzled as his penitent. His strongest reproof was—
“Ah, that was wrong, my child. Thou must not do that again.”
So that confession to Father Nicholas, while eminently comfortable to a dead soul, was anything but satisfying to a living one.
Father Warner was a terrible confessor. His minute questions penetrated into every corner of soul and body. He took nothing for granted, good nor bad. Absolution was hard to get from him, and not to be had on any terms but those of severe penance. And yet it seemed to Doucebelle that there was an inner sanctuary of her heart from which he never even tried to lift the veil, a depth in her nature which he never approached. Was it because there was no such depth in his, and therefore he necessarily ignored its existence in another?
In one way or another, they were all miserable comforters. She wished to try Father Bruno.
Most unwittingly, Father Nicholas helped her to gain her end by requesting a holiday. He had heard a rumour that a Latin manuscript had been discovered in the library of Saint Albans’ Abbey, and Father Nicholas, in whose eyes the lost books of Livy were of more consequence than any thing else in the world except the Order of Saint Benedict, was unhappy till he had seen the manuscript.
The Countess, in the Earl’s absence, readily granted his request, and Doucebelle’s fear of hurting the feelings of her kind-hearted though careless old friend were no longer a bar in the way of consulting Father Bruno.
Father Warner, who was confessing the other half of the household, growled his disapprobation when Doucebelle begged to be included in the penitents of Father Bruno.
“Something new always catches a silly girl’s fancy!” said he.
But Doucebelle had no scruple about hurting his feelings, since she did not believe in their existence. So when her turn came, she knelt down in Bruno’s confessional.