"I believe in our holy Church and all that she teaches. Father, I beseech you to absolve me from my sins."
So striking was the change that the priest himself was cowed by it, and his personal pride in his conquest of her soul was drowned in a great awe. He had first to thank God for having chosen him as the instrument of his will, and then he spoke to Evelyn of the wonder and magnitude of God's mercies. That at the very height of her artistic career he should have roused her to a sense of her own exceeding sinfulness was a miracle of his grace.
His presence by her at that moment was a balm. She heard him say that life would not be an easy one, but that she must not be discouraged, that she must remember that she had made her peace with God, and would derive strength from his sacraments. An extraordinary sweetness came over her, she seemed borne away upon a delicious sweetness; she was conscious of an extraordinary inward presence. She did not dare to look up, or even to think, but buried herself in prayer, experiencing all the while the most wonderful and continuous sensation of delight. She had been racked and torn, and had fallen at his feet a helpless mass of suffering humanity. He had healed her, and she felt hope and life returning to her again, and sufficient strength to get up and continue her way. Never again would she be alone; he would be always near to guide her. She heard him tell her that she must recite daily for penance the hymn veni sanctus spiritus, and the thought of this obedience to him refreshed her as the first draught of spring water refreshes the wanderer who for weeks has hesitated between the tortures of thirst and the foul water of brackish desert pools. She was conscious that he was making the sign of the cross over her bowed head, the murmured Latin formula sounded strangely familiar and delicious in her ears, with the more clearly enunciated "Ego te absolvo" towards the close. In that supreme moment for which she had longed, the last traces of Owen's agnostic teaching seemed to fall from her, and she was carried back to the days of her girlhood, to the days of her old prayer-book, a "Garden of the Soul" bound in ivory; and she rose from her knees, weak, but happy as a convalescent.
"I hope you will sleep well to-night," said Monsignor, kindly, noticing the signs of physical exhaustion in Evelyn as she stood mechanically drawing down her veil and putting on her gloves. "A good conscience is the best of all narcotics." Evelyn smiled through her tears, but could not trust herself to speak. "But I don't really like you living alone in Park Lane. It is too great a strain on your nerves. Could you not go to your father's for a time?"
"Yes, perhaps, I don't know. Dear father would like to have me."
He told her that the Mass he was to say to-morrow he would offer up for her; and as she drove home her joy grew more intense, and in a sort of spiritual intoxication she identified herself with the faith of her childhood. Life again presented possibilities of infinite perfection, and she was astonished that the difficulties which she had thought insuperable had been so easily overcome.
All that evening she thought of God and his sacraments, and remembering the moment when his grace had descended upon her and all had become clear, she perforce believed in a miracle—a miracle of grace had certainly happened.
She looked forward to the moment when her maid would leave the room, and she would throw herself on her knees and lose herself in prayer, as she had lost herself when she knelt beside Monsignor, and he absolved her from sin. But when the door closed she was incapable of prayer, she only desired sleep. Her whole mind seemed to have veered. She had exaggerated everything, conducted herself strangely, hysterically, and her prayers were repeated without ardour, almost indifferently.