When, after some time, Miriam awoke, she found her mistress (for her patent of freedom was not yet completed) lying at her feet, over which she had sobbed herself to sleep. She understood at once the full meaning and merit of this self-humiliation; she did not stir, but thanked God with a full heart that her sacrifice had been accepted.
Fabiola, on awaking, crept back to her own couch, as she thought, unobserved. A secret, sharp pang it had cost her to perform this act of self-abasement; but she had thoroughly humbled the pride of her heart. She felt for the first time that her heart was Christian.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
MIRIAM’S HISTORY.
“Venerable priest of God, I confide to your fatherly care this catechumen, who desires to be fully instructed in the mysteries of our holy faith, and to be regenerated by the waters of eternal salvation.”
“What!” asked Fabiola, amazed, “are you more than a physician?”
“I am, my child,” the old man replied; “unworthily I hold likewise the higher office of a priest in God’s Church.”
Fabiola unhesitatingly knelt before him, and kissed his hand. The priest placed his right hand upon her head, and said to her:
“Be of good courage, daughter; you are not the first of your house whom God has brought into His holy Church. It is now many years since I was called in here, under the guise of a physician, by a former servant, now no more; but in reality it was to baptize, a few hours before her death, the wife of Fabius.”
“My mother!” exclaimed Fabiola. “She died immediately after giving me birth. And did she die a Christian?”