"I will never promise it."
VI.
"If any thing can recall her to a sense of her duty," remarked Miss Louisa Hildyard, as she consulted that night alone with her father and mother, the family priest being alike present, "it will be a prolonged residence in that blessed convent. There her mind may be led to peace. Oh, that she had been brought up in it!"
"You say right, my daughter," acquiesced the priest. "I see no other way to reclaim her; for here, alas! the temptations of worldly life must ever interfere, and counteract all good effects that might be wrought. Place her in the convent. I myself will be her conductor thither, and will offer up my prayers that the step may conduce to her spiritual welfare."
Mr. and Mrs. Hildyard started, and the former smoothed his hand across his brow, as if pain had settled there.
"Your inclinations may be at variance with this counsel," continued the holy father, breaking the silence which had followed, "but will you oppose them to the salvation of her immortal soul? I see no other way to save it."
And so it was decided; but not until the night hours had grown into morning.
"Oh, the holy work that will have been wrought, should the heart of this erring lamb be won over to a peaceful life, and embrace the vail!" uttered the priest in the ear of Miss Louisa, as he bestowed upon her the night benediction, ere retiring from the council. "We shall say then that that carnal-minded apostate was sent to this house in mercy."
VII.
But three days had elapsed, when a traveling-carriage drove into the outer yard of the convent of the Nuns of the Visitation in —— shire. A young lady descended from it, and those in attendance gently led her forward, now through one court-yard, now through another, until the interior of the convent was gained. Then the great gates closed with a bang that almost shook the building, and Frances Hildyard was shut out from the world she had so idolized.