, and should not so easily get out of the convent. My hope was, that the Earl would speedily insist upon my speedy release, (little dreaming at the moment that he was the instigator [60] ]of my detention, and had actually acted as confessor in the assumed name of Father Francisco.)
My anxiety was greatly increased the next day, when hour after hour passed, and still no communication from the Confessor or Superior, the nuns who brought me in breakfast and dinner were silent to all my enquiries or offers of bribes if they would help me get out of the place.
My watch had stopped for want of a key, but about seven o’clock
in the evening, as near as I could guess, the old priest opened the door, and beckoned me to follow him. My heart suddenly recovered its courage, and I braced up my nerves to bear the severest penance; we passed along several passages, and at last opening a door, he motioned me to enter.
There, sitting before a small table, which had a bible and crucifix upon it, sat a rather young priest, about the same age as my husband, but with a close shaven face and crown (the Earl had heavy whiskers and [61] ]moustache, I had never seen him otherwise), and he struck me as being very like Francis about the nose and eyes, still, no suspicion that it could really be him
came into my mind.
“Daughter Lucille, Lady Ellington,” said the seated Confessor, as the other locked the door behind me, “In answer to prayer, the Holy Mother has inspired us to grant you absolution, only after the most severe personal chastisement and humiliations we can possibly inflict upon you. Then, you will
return to your confiding loving husband, purified of your adulterous sins, but for all that, he will still, and for the rest of his life, wear the horns of a cuckolded husband, which is his punishment for teaching you such lascivious ideas; it is an awful sin to so abandon yourselves to lust, and your unfaithfulness is the providential punishment he so well deserves.”
My face and neck were suffused with the blushes of burning shame, as my eyes fell beneath his ardent gaze, besides something [62] ]instinctively told me that both Father Francisco and his coadjutor were enjoying the sight of my confusion.
“Now please divest yourself of everything you have on, except corset, chemise and drawers, whilst I prepare this scourger for the chastisement of your wicked sensual flesh, and my brother here will get that rope in order, ready to tie up your hands above your head.”