“And if it still rains?”

“Come all the same.  But I must fly.”

He pressed Durtal’s hand and was gone.

CHAPTER VI.

“Yes, I know when I confessed in her presence that I did not yet know of which Saint I might write the history, Madame Bavoil—­dear Madame Bavoil, as the Abbe Gevresin calls her—­exclaimed:  ’The life of Jeanne de Matel!  Why not?’

“But it is a biography that is not easy to deal with or that can be lightly handled,” said Durtal to himself, as he arranged the notes he had collected by degrees as bearing on this Venerable woman.

And he sat meditating.

“What is quite unintelligible,” said he to himself, “is the disproportion between the promises made to her by Jesus and the results achieved.  Never, I really believe, have so many tribulations and hindrances, or so much ill-fortune attended the founding of a new Order.  Jeanne spent her days on the high roads, running from one monastery to another, and toil as she would to dig up the conventual soil, nothing would grow.  She could not even assume the habit of her Institution, or at any rate only a few minutes before her death, for, in order to travel with greater ease all over France, she wore the livery of a world she abominated, and to which she appealed in vain in the name of the Lord to take an interest in the formation of her cloister.  Unhappy woman!  She went to Court—­as her confessor Father de Gibalin bears witness, while he testifies that he had never known a humbler soul—­as others go to the stake.

“And yet the Lord certainly commanded her to found this Order of the Incarnate Word.  He sketched the scheme, laid down the rule, and prescribed the costume, explaining its symbolism, declaring that the white robe of its maidens would do honour to that with which He was mockingly invested in Herod’s palace; that their red cloak would keep in memory that which was cast over Him in the house of Pilate; that their crimson scapulary and girdle would preserve the remembrance of the stake and the cords dyed in His blood.  And He seems to have mocked her.

“He solemnly assured her that after sorrowful trials the seed she had sown should bring forth an abundant harvest of nuns.  He expressly told her that she would rank as the sister of Saint Theresa and Saint Clare; those holy women appeared to ratify these promises by their presence, and when nothing would come of it, nothing would work, when, quite worn out, she burst into tears, the Lord calmly bade her be still and take patience.

“Meanwhile, she was living amid a howling storm of recrimination and threats.  The clergy persecute her, the Archbishop of Lyon, the Cardinal de Richelieu, aims only at hindering the completion of her abbeys on his lands; she cannot even manage her Sisterhood, since we find her wandering in search of a protector or an assistant; they are torn by divisions, and their insubordination is such that at length she is compelled to return in hot haste, and, with many tears, expel the contumacious sisters from the cloister.