‘At last, thickhead that I am, I thought I understood.’
‘Ah!’ said Sara, ‘when I saw you come in, I thought you were of the same nature as a phantom–a dead man, who visited me last night, an evil spirit which I exorcised by the use of your name. I thought I saw your ghost, Rudolf.’
L’ENVOI.
Six months later Jerome Wellfield was formally received into the Roman Catholic Church, in the large chapel at Brentwood; and six years later Nita’s child was sent to the college of that name, there to begin his studies under the polished and accomplished supervision of the Fathers of the Society of Jesus.
Green wave the trees to this day over the river walk of Wellfield Abbey, and placidly that stream flows past the ruined cloisters, and under the wooded ‘Nab.’ The Abbey farms are as fat, and the Abbey lands as productive now, as they were in the days of its proudest fame. Once, years after these things had happened, a carriage, with a lady and a gentleman in it, drove through the village of Wellfield, over the bridge, away from John Leyburn’s house. The persons in the carriage had been to pay a flying visit to John Leyburn’s wife. As their carriage drove slowly up a steep hill just outside the village, they saw below them to the right the whole of the Abbey–the river, the avenue, even the ancient, hoary front of the house, and the lawn before it. It was a brilliant July evening, and they saw, slowly walking about that garden, three figures–that of a tall man, who held the hand of a slender, graceful-looking boy, whose face was turned towards his guide, and beside them, the figure of a priest, who appeared to be speaking earnestly, and who raised his hand now and then, as if to enforce his argument. The two travellers looked long at this group, and at the slender shadows they cast upon the dazzling green of the grass–as long as they could see it, until a bend in the road shut it all abruptly from their view: and then they looked, each into the other’s face.
‘What a life! What an ignominious slavery!’ observed Falkenberg, with more than a tinge of contempt in his tone.
‘If he finds peace in it, Rudolf?’