"One day, not long ago, I was coming along the top of the ramparts,—madame has not been there?"
"No."
"There is a broad space on the top, and it is covered with soft green turf quite pleasant to sit down upon. Very few people pass, and you can see a long way out to sea. Well, one day I came along there, because upon the grass it was pleasanter walking than on the stones in the street, and I saw Mademoiselle Lucia who was sitting quite quiet, looking out far away. I came very near, but she never saw me. I thought I would speak to her just to say how beautiful the day was, and the air so sweet, when I saw just in time madame, that she was crying. Great big tears were falling down on her hands, and she never seemed to feel them even. Mon Dieu, madame! I could hardly keep from crying myself, she looked so sad; but I went by softly, and she never saw me. Mademoiselle regrets England very much."
"She has never been in England. She was born in Canada, and that, you know, is very far away."
"In Canada! Is it possible? Does madame come from Canada?"
"Yes."
"And it is in Canada our good father Paul has suffered so much! Oh, the terrible country!"
"Why should it be terrible? I have seen Father Paul, and he does not look as if he had suffered much."
"Not now, Dieu merci. But long ago. Madame, he went to convert the savages—the Indians."
Mrs. Costello started. Father Paul was a Jesuit priest—an old venerable man—old enough, as it flashed into her mind, to have been one of the Moose Island missionaries. Yet such an idea was improbable—there had no doubt been many other Jesuit missions besides the one where Christian had been trained.