And he held to his resolution through a terrific storm, in spite of a crew on the brink of mutiny, and finally sailed into port with the sacred image, which had, he believed, miraculously preserved them. And ever after, as they sailed, a little image of Christ sailed with them, fixed in the bows; and at night, during storms at sea, the sailors, albeit no Catholics, would bow their heads in passing it, and mutter a word of prayer for aid; and one old sailor, to whom for thirty years the land had been strange and the sea a home, used to tell how, on one terrible night of that long storm when the stone Christ had been their sole freight left, the crew, lashed to mast and spar, and looking every moment for destruction, had seen a white form glide forth from the hold, and, standing in the bows, stretch out its hands over the waves, which, with the gale, sank away to silence before them, leaving only the gentle breeze that had wafted them on their way home.
"I leave him to you, O shadow of my Lord!" the priest said. "Speak to him! call him so that he cannot resist you!"
He then returned to his work, somewhat relieved. "No trial is insupportable to him who has faith," he thought. "And may be all this trouble has come upon him in order that he might lift his eyes and behold that Christ whom he has denied standing with arms outstretched to receive him."
But notwithstanding this faint comfort, the second message did not find F. Chevreuse so absorbed as the first had. He could with difficulty command his thoughts, and was constantly lifting his head to listen for an approaching step, or starting at a fancied knock at the door.
Near the close of the afternoon the boy came, when the light was so dim that the note could be read only by taking it to the window.
"They have opened the case a long way off," Mr. Macon wrote. "They have proved that Mr. Schöninger has a lawsuit in England which involves a large fortune. It costs him every dollar he can raise, his opponents being an established family of wealth and influence, who have for years been in possession of the property he claims. They have proved that during the year ending last April his lawyers received from him fifteen hundred dollars in quarterly payments, and that in April they wrote that, without larger advances of money, it would be impossible for them to carry on the claim. In May, then, he sent them five hundred dollars, in June five hundred more, and on the first of September a thousand dollars. That closes the business for this afternoon."
"And what is the impression made?" F. Chevreuse asked Mr. Macon, when that gentleman called on him in the evening.
"The impression, or rather the conviction, is that Mr. Schöninger was in a condition to make a man desperate in his wish for money. An immense fortune might be secured by expending a few thousands then, and would certainly be lost if he had not the few thousands. They brought in a crowd of small tattlers to show that about the time he received this letter, and after, he was in great distress and agitation of mind; that he lost his appetite, and was heard walking to and fro in his chamber at night. Furthermore, it is evident that the money was obtained in some way after the first of May, though it was not all sent at that time. People naturally ask where the money came from, since he was not known to have any in bank, and was supposed to have sent before all he earned above what was necessary for him to live on."
"Poor fellow!" said F. Chevreuse pityingly. "What a trouble there was all the time under that calm exterior! For I never saw him otherwise than calm. Why, people might comment on my walking my room at night. I frequently walk so when I am thinking, and always when I say my beads."