“The change is so sudden to me,” she said.
Stephen of Lehon spread his hands with a gesture of fatherly assent.
“And yet, my daughter, there is wisdom in this work of his. Your brother’s pride is in the dust, and in the dust man’s humbleness may find that subtle and mysterious seed that has its flowering when the heart is sad.”
“It is difficult for me, father, not to grudge the past.”
“Is there, then, no glory, child, save in the service of the sword?”
He looked at her with an amiable austerity whose humaneness had not hardened into the mere dogmatism of the priest. Abbot Stephen still boasted the instinctive sympathy of youth. As for Tiphaïne, she glanced at Bertrand, who had drawn back into the room, arguing in her heart that it was better to fight God’s battle in the world than to dream dreams in a religious house.
“Christ our Lord was but a carpenter.” And the Abbot crossed himself.
“I remember it.”
“In the simple things of life the heart finds comfort. A sinless working with the hands leads to a sinless working of the soul. It was the lad himself who prayed me to give him work to do.”
She put her hands together as though in prayer.