"What! my husband may not come to see me! I shall never see him again? Then take your child back again. I will not stop. I will go away on the spot."
"Oh! what a wild fury!" exclaimed the horrified Prior, "to fly into such a passion at once; think of the sacred place you are in--would you cause a scandal among our chaste brethren by your foolish worldly affections?"
"That is all one to me. Only I must see my husband once more, else I shall die of heartache--if I had known it I would never have come--never, never."
"Think of the high wages--you will be made rich by the gratitude of the convent, your house will be raised, your husband freed most likely, absolved from his bondage to the convent--"
"That is all one to me," repeated the woman with increased vehemence. "If I can never see my husband I will not stop--do as you will," and she laid the baby on the bed and was hastening past the Prior and out of the room, but he held her back.
"In the name of all the Saints--stay; will you leave the poor child to starve? There is not another woman in the village who can nurse it and take care of it. Can you be so cruel?"
The woman burst into tears, and turned to the bed again.
"No, you shall not starve, poor little orphan--you cannot help it!" and she seated herself on the edge of the bed, took the child pitifully in her arms and unheedful of the monk clasped it to her breast; the child drank eagerly while her tears ran down upon it. The Prior turned away and stood puzzled. He remembered how in his childhood he had never dared to vex his mother while she was nursing his little brother for fear the baby should not thrive, if the milk were turned by her anger. What should he do now to soothe the wet-nurse?
"Listen to me," he said at last, "I know of another way out of the difficulty for you; I will allow you to see your husband again, outside the convent gate, now and then for half an hour; that I will take upon myself. If that will satisfy you, we are all content--the child, ourselves and you."
The woman sighed, but she nodded assent in silence. It was better than nothing, and she felt she could not let the child starve, she could never be happy with her husband again, if she had loaded her conscience with such a dreadful sin for his sake.