"Singular? No! The dream is explainable enough. Day before yesterday Hervé was telling me of the charitable nature of Brother St. Ernest-Martyr. That same evening we saw the poor monk carried into our house with his face bleeding. That I should have been deeply impressed, and should have dreamt of him, I understand. But what I do not understand is that when I am awake, wide awake, I should still think of him. Look, even now, when I shut my eyes"—and, smiling, Hena suited the action to the words—"I still see him as if he stood there, with that kind face of his that he turns upon the little children."
"But, my dear daughter, when you think of Brother St. Ernest-Martyr, what is the nature of your thoughts?"
Hena pondered for an instant, and then answered:
"I would not know how to explain it to you, mother. When I think of him I say to myself: 'How good, how generous, how brave is Brother St. Ernest-Martyr! Day before yesterday he braved the sword to defend Mary La Catelle; another day, on the Notre Dame Bridge, he leaped into the water to save an unhappy man who was drowning; he picks up little deserted children, or gives them instruction with so much interest and affection that their own father could not display more solicitude in them.'"
"Thinking over it, dear child, there is nothing in all that but what is perfectly natural. The brother is an upright man. Your thoughts turn upon his good deeds. That's quite simple."
"No, mother, it is not quite so simple as you put it! Are not you all that is best in this world? Is not my father as upright a man as Brother St. Ernest-Martyr? Are not you two my beloved and venerated parents? And yet—that is what puzzles me, how comes it that I oftener think of him than of either of you?"
And after a pause the young maid added in an accent of adorable candor:
"I tell you, mother, it is truly extraordinary!"
Several impatient raps, given at the street door interrupted the conversation. Bridget said to her daughter:
"Open the window, and see who it is that knocks. Probably it is your brother."