The Abbot detained Donatus as he was going into the house.
"Where are you going all alone, Donatus?" he called out. The youth stood still, but was silent, and the Abbot beckoned him to come back to his side.
"What ails you, my son?" he asked. "You seem to be ill. Your temples are throbbing and your eyes have a feverish wandering glitter; you have refused every kind of nourishment since yesterday--Tell me what ails you?"
"Nothing, father; I am quite well."
"Then some new temptation assails you, my son; for it is of no avail to tell me that all is well with you as usual," said the Abbot, and he drew him aside into a retired vine-alley. "You cannot deceive me, for I have brought you up from the time when you were four years old. My watchful eye has been upon you night and day, in joy and in grief, in health and in sickness. I know every line of your face and mark every shade that passes over it, and you have become so completely one with me that every throb of your heart is felt in mine, and every burden that weighs on your soul oppresses mine. You cannot deceive me, and I am filled with a cruel forboding, as if some fearful evil were lowering over your darkened brow."
Donatus breathed painfully under the Abbot's searching gaze; he was like a sick man who conceals his sufferings the longest from those that love him most. His eyes fell; an unutterable and tender sorrow came over him for the faithful guardian whom he purposed to betray in so frightful a manner as soon as sleep should have closed his watchful eyes.
"You are silent! You are concealing some evil from me?" continued the Abbot. "For I never before saw you thus. I am not satisfied at your having had so much private talk with Correntian since yesterday--and indeed one of the brethren declared that he had seen you steal at night to Correntian's cell! What can you two have to say to each other?--Why, he has been your mortal enemy ever since you were old enough to think! How is this! when such an unnatural alliance is formed there must be some terrible trouble or dividing of heart at the bottom of it. You are young and generous, you indeed may forget and honestly forgive--but not Correntian--never. He is a rock on which many a poor young heart has struck and bled to death when only a loving hand was needed to rescue it. It is this hard nature of his that alienates him from us all, and it is with the greatest anxiety that I see you falling into his power."
Donatus walked on in silence and reserve by the side of the Abbot, who waited in vain for his answer.
Presently the Abbot stood still, as if he would force the young man to look at him. "My son," he said, "Do you remember the evening when that sinister man tore you from your nurse's lap, and how you struggled and screamed till I came and took you in my arms? Do you remember how you threw your arms round my neck and clung to me, and how I myself put you into your little bed, and you would not leave go of my hand till you had sobbed yourself to sleep? This heart of mine is still the same as when you found refuge in it, these arms are the same as those to which you then ran for protection; throw yourself into them again, my son, and shake off the burden that torments you, so that I may once more protect you against the powers of darkness that threaten you."
Donatus could bear it no longer; tears rushed to his eyes, and crying out, "My father, my dearest father!" he threw himself into the Abbot's arms. The two men stood clasped in a mute embrace, but at this instant of sacred silence Correntian came hurrying up.