"Now you are meddling with matters far too high for you, Prudence!" said I. "As for my vows, there can be none broken where there were none made, and for the rest, beware my Lord's anger! If he should hear that you had but breathed on the fair fame of his wife, it were better you had never been born!"
She winced a little at this, and took refuge in tears and exclamations that ever she had lived to see the day: and so took her leave, meaning, as she says, to go to her sisters at Bristol. Yet I hear she hath not gone, but is staying with some one here in the village, making a great show of devotion, and specially of saying her prayers at my mother's grave. I wish she would go away, I know not why, but I do dread some mischief from her tongue.
What she said about lying has set me to looking up all the passages in Scripture relating to the same. I find plenty of them condemning the sin in the strongest terms, as even that all liars shall have their part in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone, which is the second death; and yet it is true, as she said, that the Church counts it but a venial sin. I cannot understand it.
[CHAPTER XXIX.]
June 20.
I HAVE been called on to make a very solemn and awful decision—and I have made it. Some days ago my father sent for me into his room, and said to me:
"Rosamond, the time has come for you to decide upon your way of life. If you are going back to the convent it is time and more that you were gone. You know what your mother's and my wishes once were on the subject. You have seen what convent life is, and now you must decide what you will do—whether you will become a nun, or live at home."
I was struck dumb for a few minutes. It had never occurred to me that I was to be called upon to decide the matter. I had somehow supposed that it would be settled for me.