“Did I mention a name?  Ah! what inadvertence!  I never intended to let that name slip out.  I am very sorry to have done so. Mea Culpa!  Mea Culpa!  Mea maxima culpa!” muttered the abbess, bending her head and smiting her bosom.

“Mother Genevieve!  Oh, do not trifle with me! do not torture me!  I heard a name!  Did I hear aright?  Oh, I hope I did not!  What name did you murmur?  Tell me! tell me!  WHO met Count Waldemar in a duel?” demanded Salome.

“I have no choice but to tell you now, though I would willingly have kept the fact from you.  It was the Duke of Hereward, the late duke of course, the deeply-wronged lover of that fair woman, who met, and, as I heard, killed Count Waldemar de Volaski.  But there were wrongs on both sides, deep, deadly wrongs on every side!” moaned the lady, clasping her hands convulsively and lowering her eyes.

“The Duke of Hereward!  Heaven of heavens! the Duke of Hereward!  Yes!  I heard aright the first time; but I could not believe my own ears!  The father of my betrothed!” murmured Salome, sinking back in her seat.

The abbess gravely bent her head.

“What of the frail woman?  She was not—­oh! no, she could not have been the mother of the present duke?”

“No,” murmured the abbess, in a low voice.

“Mother Genevieve!” exclaimed Salome, suddenly, “will you tell me all you know of this terrible story?”

“My daughter, my past is dead and buried these many years; so I would leave it until the last great day of the Resurrection.  Nevertheless, as the story of my life is interwoven with that of the princely line in whom you feel so deep an interest, I will relate it.”

“Thanks, good mother,” said Salome, nestling to her side and preparing to listen.

“Not here, and not now, my child, can I enter upon the long, sorrowful, shameful story—­a story of pride, despotism and cruelty on one side; of passion, wilfulness and recklessness on the other; of selfishness, sin and ruin on all sides!  Daughter, in almost every tale of sin and suffering you will find that there has always been sin on one side and suffering on the other; but in this story all sinned deeply, all suffered fearfully!”

“Except yourself, sweet mother.  You never sinned,” said Salome, taking the thin, pale hand of the lady and pressing it to her lips.

“Mea culpa! I sin every hour of my life!” cried the abbess, crossing herself.

“We all do; but you did not sin there,” said the girl.

“I had no part—­no active part, I mean—­in that tale of guilt and woe.  I was a pupil here in this convent then, waiting to be brought out and married to my betrothed.  No, I had no part in that tragedy.”

“Except the passive part of suffering.”

“Ay, except the passive part of suffering; but hark, my child! the vesper bell is ringing; it calls us to our evening worship:  let us go to the choir, and there forget all our earthly cares and seek the peace of Heaven,” said the pale lady, slowly rising from her seat.