"My father drinks and swears," young Crowberry answered. "But according to his lights he is a Christian. It is his teachers' fault, not his own, that he believes the Pope to be Anti-Christ, or the Man of Sin, or the Scarlet Woman. He ceased to read and think so long ago that his ideas cannot be changed. What would you have me do? I say nothing. I go my own way. The same with my friends. They think I'm a mere rattle like a few dry peas in a box. Let them. I prefer it."
"But, sooner or later, you must take the great step and you must declare it. What will your father say then?"
"He will say what he always says when I cross him—that I shan't have a penny of his money. If he were still rich I could stand up and simply say, 'Sir, keep the money; only pray let me call my soul my own.' But I know, and he knows, and each of us knows the other knows, that there won't be a penny to leave. In his old age I must support my father, and I shall be proud to do it. But, meanwhile, I can only hold my tongue."
After another long pause the monk said:
"One more question. This young lady Isabel. You were so eager to know my opinion of her. Why? Is there anything between you?"
Young Crowberry laughed aloud; and only when his laughter had subsided through many guffaws and chucklings could he speak.
"Is there anything between me and Isabel?" he echoed. "Yes. There is. By Jove, there's a good deal. There's an iron door. There's a brick wall. No, a stone wall—stone-cold, like a wall of ice. Anything between us? There's the whole world; also the sun, moon, planets, and fixed stars, not to mention a few comets and the Milky Way." And he chuckled again.
"Yet you're greatly interested in her," objected Antonio.
"No doubt," admitted young Crowberry. "I'm inquisitive. I'm mightily curious to know what there is behind the iron door, what there is over the brick wall. Not that it is reciprocal. Isabel thinks of me as a mere infant. Or, rather, Isabel doesn't think of me at all. She can't remember my existence; and I can't forget hers. She rubs up my quills the wrong way; but I can't even prick her fingers."
"You know her ten times better than I do," said Antonio. "Yet, after our two meetings, I suspect that you misjudge her. Any hardness—and I haven't found her so hard, after all—may be her misfortune, rather than her fault, like her irreligion. To tell the truth, Edward, I thought you wanted to marry her."