"Martin said he met your father coming from Avranches yesterday. What took him so far from home?"
"I don't know; they never tell me anything," answered Lucille, her face clouding.
"There might be a very good reason for his not telling you," I remarked in a low tone. "If his journey was about the Religion, it might be a great deal better for you to be able to say you did not know. And I dare say it was, for my father has been away a great deal of late."
"Oh, the Religion—always the Religion!" said Lucille between her teeth; "I hate the very name of the Religion."
"Lucille, how dare you?" I gasped, rather than spoke. I was too shocked to say more.
"Well, I do," she returned vehemently. "It spoils everything. It separates families and neighbors, shuts us up just to our own little selves, and cuts us off from everything that is pleasant. Jennette Maury can go to the Sunday fêtes and the dances on feast days under the great chestnut, but I must stay at home and read a musty book, because I am of the Religion. Other people live in peace, and nobody interferes with them. We live with a sword hung over our heads, and our daily path is like that over the Grève yonder—likely to swallow us up any time. And what do we gain by it in this world, I should like to know?"
"What should we lose in the next world if we deserted it?" I asked, finding my voice at last.
"I am not talking of deserting it. I am no Judas, though they seem to think I am by the way they treat me—never telling me anything. But I don't see why we should not have kept to the ways of our fathers, and saved all this trouble."
"WE DO keep to the faith of our fathers," said I, repeating the proud boast of the Vaudois, which I had long ago learned by heart. "Our church never was corrupted by Rome, and did not need reforming. But, Lucille, what would your father and mother say to such words?"
"I should never say such words to them," answered Lucille, "and I am foolish to say them to you. I suppose, however, you will go and repeat them to every one, and let the world say how much better and more religious is the heiress of the Tour d'Antin than poor Lucille Sablot."