"What!" she cried. "Doth not a father know his own child? Fie, Gerard, to pretend! 'Tis thine own flesh and blood thou holdest to thine heart."
Long they sat and talked that night, and the end of it was Clement promised to leave his cave for the manse at Gouda. But once the new vicar was installed Margaret kept away from the parsonage. She left little Gerard there to complete the conquest her maternal heart ascribed to him, and contented herself with stolen meetings with her child.
Then the new vicar of Gouda, his beard close shaved, and in a grey frock and large felt hat, came to bring her to the vicarage.
"My sweet Margaret!" he cried. "Why is this? Why hold you aloof from your own good deed? We have been waiting and waiting for you every day, and no Margaret."
And Margaret went to the manse, and found Catherine, Clement's mother, there; and next day being Sunday the two women heard the Vicar of Gouda preach in his own church. It was crammed with persons, who came curious, but remained. Never was Clement's gift as a preacher displayed more powerfully. In a single sermon, which lasted two hours, and seemed to last but twenty minutes, he declared the whole scripture.
The two women in a corner sat entranced, with streaming eyes.
As soon as they were by themselves, Margaret threw her arms round Catherine's neck and kissed her.
"Mother, mother, I am not quite a happy woman, but oh! I am a proud one."
And she vowed on her knees never by word or deed to let her love come between this young saint and heaven.
The child, who lived to become the great Erasmus, was already winning a famous name at school, when Margaret was stricken with the plague and died. A fortnight later and Clement left his vicarage and entered the Dominican convent to end life as he began it. A few days later and he, too, was dead, and the convent counted him a saint.