"Alan—please listen to me! If Laura did become a Catholic—is there anything in the way—anything you can't undo?"
He raised himself quickly. He would have suffered these questions from no one else. The stern and irritable temper that he inherited from his father had gained fast upon the old self-control since the events of October. Even now, with Augustina, he was short.
"I shall take no vows, dear, before the time. But it would please me—it would console me—if you would put all these things out of your head. I see the will of God very plainly. Let us submit to it."
"It hurts me so—to see you suffer!" she said, looking at him piteously.
He bent over the grass, struggling for composure.
"I shall have something else to do before long," he said in a low voice, "than to consider my own happiness."
She was framing another question, when there was a sound of footsteps on the gravel behind them.
Augustina exclaimed, with the agitation of weakness, "Don't let any visitors come!" Helbeck looked a moment in astonishment, then his face cleared.
"Augustina!—it is the relic—from the Carmelite nuns. I recognise their
Confessor."
Augustina clasped her hands; and Sister Rosa, obeying Helbeck's signal, came quickly over to her. Mr. Helbeck bared his head and walked over the grass to meet the strange priest, who was carrying a small leather box.