Monsignor continued to read Ulick’s letter.  Evelyn wished he would read Owen’s; Ulick’s interested her not in the least.

“Mr. Dean seems a very extraordinary person.  Does he believed in astrology, the casting of horoscopes, or is it mere affectation?”

“I don’t know; he always talks like that.  He believes, or says he believes, in Lir and the great Mother Dana, in the old Irish Gods.  But, Monsignor, please read Sir Owen’s letter.  I want to know what I am to do.”

He walked once across the room, and when he returned to the table he said half to himself, as if his thoughts had long out-stripped his words—­

“I am glad I advised you to leave Park Lane, for of course he will go there first.”

“He will easily find out I’m at Dulwich, he need not even ask—­he will guess it at once.”

“Yes, to be sure.”

“If I am not to meet him I must go away—­but where?  All my friends and acquaintances are his friends.  You would approve of none of them Monsignor,” she said, smiling a little.

He did not seem to hear her.  Suddenly he said, “I think you had better go and spend a few days at the Passionist Convent.  The Reverend Mother sent you an invitation through me, you remember, so we need have no hesitation in proposing it.  Indeed, I feel confident that they will receive you with the greatest pleasure.  It will do you a great deal of good.  You will have peace and quiet, my child; you will find yourself in an atmosphere of faith and purity which cannot but be helpful to you in your present unsettled state.”

It seemed to Evelyn that that was what she had wanted all the time, only she had not been able to say so.  Yes; to spend a week with those dear nuns, to sit in the convent garden, to kneel before the Blessed Sacrament in the convent church, it would be a real spiritual luxury.

“Yes, I should love to go,” she said.  “I feel it is just what I need.  I have so much to think out, so much to learn, and at home there are a hundred things to distract me.”

“Very well, then, that is settled.  I will send the Reverend Mother word to-morrow; but there is no necessity, you can write yourself, and say you are coming in the afternoon; she will only have to get your room ready.”

“But, Monsignor, my Communion?  I had forgotten it was from you I was to receive Holy Communion.  Of course I know it doesn’t really make any difference, but still, you heard my confession, and I would far rather receive Communion this first time from you than from anyone else.  I don’t think it could be quite the same thing—­if it weren’t from you.”

“And I should be sorry too, my child, as by God’s grace I have been the means of bringing you thus far, not to complete your reconciliation to him.  But I think we can manage that too without much difficulty.  I say Mass to-morrow at nine o’clock, and will give you Communion then, and you can go to the convent for your retreat early in the afternoon.  Will that suit you?”