The lady with him drew closer, arranging the folds of the ample veil which partially concealed her face, so that she might watch more closely. But it was on Don Ambrogio Morelli that she fixed her gaze with painful intensity, reading the success or failure of the orator in her brother's countenance.
"Ambrogio!" she entreated, when the argument had been presented and received with every sign of triumph that the sacredness of the place made decorous, "thou knowest that I have no understanding of the Latin—was it unanswerable?"
"Nay," her brother answered, uneasily; "it was fine, surely; but have no fear, Fra Teodoro is not incontrovertible, and the Servi have better methods."
"May one ask the name of the disputant who is to respond?" a stranger questioned courteously of Don Ambrogio.
"It is a brother who hath but entered their order yesterday," Don
Ambrogio answered, with some hesitation, "by name Pierino—nay, Fra
Paolo. He is reputed learned; yet if the methods of the order be strange
to him, one should grant indulgence. For he is reputed learned——"
He was conscious of repeating the words for his own encouragement, with a heart less brave than he could have wished. But the information was pleasantly echoed about, as the ranks of the Servi parted and an old man, with a face full of benignity, came forward, holding the hand of a boy with blue eyes and light hair, who walked timidly with him to the pulpit on the left, where the older man encouraged the shrinking disputant to mount the stair.
There was a murmur of astonishment as the young face appeared in the tribunal of that grave assembly.
"Impossible! It is only a child!"
It was, in truth, a strange picture; this child of thirteen, small and delicate for his years, yet with a face of singular freshness and gravity, his youthfulness heightened by cassock and cowl—a unique, simple figure, against the bizarre magnificence of the background, the central point of interest for that learned and brilliant assembly, as he stood there above the beautiful kneeling angel who held the Book of the Law, just under the pulpit.
For a moment he seemed unable to face his audience, then, with an effort, he raised his hand, nervously pushing back the white folds of his unaccustomed cowl, and casting a look of perplexity over the sea of faces before him; but the expression of trouble slowly cleared away as his eyes met those of a friar, grave and bent, who had stepped out from the company of the Servi and fixed upon the boy a steadying gaze of assurance, triumph, and command. It was Fra Gianmaria, who was known throughout Venice for his great learning.