At the station I met Lord Loring.  He understood that I too had received bad news, and gave me a place in the coupe carriage which had been reserved for him.  We had hardly taken our seats when we saw Father Benwell among the travelers on the platform, accompanied by a gray-haired gentleman who was a stranger to both of us.  Lord Loring dislikes strangers.  Otherwise, I might have found myself traveling to Paris with that detestable Jesuit for a companion.

Paris, May 3.—­On our arrival at the hotel I was informed that no message had yet been received from the Embassy.

We found Lady Loring alone at the breakfast-table, when we had rested after our night journey.

“Romayne still lives,” she said.  “But his voice has sunk to a whisper, and he is unable to breathe if he tries to rest in bed.  Stella has gone to the Embassy; she hopes to see him to-day for the second time.”

“Only for the second time!” I exclaimed.

“You forget, Mr. Winterfield, that Romayne is a priest.  He was only consecrated on the customary condition of an absolute separation from his wife.  On her side—­never let her know that I told you this—­Stella signed a formal document, sent from Rome, asserting that she consented of her own free will to the separation.  She was relieved from the performance of another formality (which I need not mention more particularly) by a special dispensation.  Under these circumstances—­communicated to me while Stella and I have been together in this house—­the wife’s presence at the bedside of her dying husband is regarded by the other priests at the Embassy as a scandal and a profanation.  The kind-hearted Nuncio is blamed for having exceeded his powers in yielding (even under protest) to the last wishes of a dying man.  He is now in communication with Rome, waiting for the final instructions which are to guide him.”

“Has Romayne seen his child?” I asked.

“Stella has taken the child with her to-day.  It is doubtful in the last degree whether the poor little boy will be allowed to enter his father’s room. That complication is even more serious than the other.  The dying Romayne persists in his resolution to see the child.  So completely has his way of thinking been altered by the approach of death, and by the closing of the brilliant prospect which was before him, that he even threatens to recant, with his last breath, if his wishes are not complied with.  How it will end I cannot even venture to guess.

“Unless the merciful course taken by the Nuncio is confirmed,” said Lord Loring, “it may end in a revival of the protest of the Catholic priests in Germany against the prohibition of marriage to the clergy.  The movement began in Silesia in 1826, and was followed by unions (or Leagues, as we should call them now) in Baden, Wurtemburg, Bavaria, and Rhenish Prussia.  Later still, the agitation spread to France and Austria.  It was only checked by a papal bull issued in 1847, reiterating the final decision of the famous Council of Trent in favor of the celibacy of the priesthood.  Few people are aware that this rule has been an institution of slow growth among the clergy of the Church of Rome.  Even as late as the twelfth century, there were still priests who set the prohibition of marriage at defiance.”