“Hem!” he said, moving his foot slightly.
This proceeding, however, was without result. The pious chant continued to resound, and the monks paid not the least attention to their visitors, but stood up together in a double line, vociferating Latin with as much zest as ever.
“Mort d’aieul!” growled Sir Godfrey, shifting his other foot, and not so gingerly this second time.
By chance the singing stopped upon the same instant, so that the Baron’s remark and the noise his foot had made sounded all over the room. This disconcerted him; for he felt his standing with the Church to be weak, and he rolled his eyes from one side to the other, watching for any effect his disturbance might have made. But, with the breeding of a true man of the world, the Grand Marshal merely observed, “Benedicite, my son!”
“Good-morning, Father,” returned Sir Godfrey.
“And what would you with me?” pursued the so-called Father Anselm. “Speak, my son.”
“Well, the fact is——” the Baron began, marching forward; but he encountered the eye of the Abbot, where shone a cold surprise at this over-familiar fashion of speech; so he checked himself, and, in as restrained a voice as he could command, told his story. How his daughter had determined to meet the Dragon, and so save Wantley; how nothing that a parent could say had influenced her intentions in the least; and now he placed the entire matter in the hands of the Church.
“Which would have been more becoming if you had done it at the first,” said Father Anselm, reprovingly. Then he turned to Miss Elaine, who all this while had been looking out of the window with the utmost indifference.
“How is this, my daughter?” he said gravely, in his deep voice.
“Oh, the dear blessed man!” whispered Mistletoe, admiringly, to herself.