As Mora walked beside him across the sunny lawn, “Father,” she said, “think you the heart of a nun can ever become again as the heart of other women?”

CHAPTER XXXVI

STRONG TO ACT; ABLE TO ENDURE

Back to Worcester rode the Bishop.

Gallop!  Gallop! along the grassy rides, beside the hard highway.

Hasten good Shulamite, black and comely still, though flecked with foam.

Important work lies ahead.  Every moment is precious.

If Mother Sub-Prioress should send to the Palace, mischief will be done, which it will not be easy to repair.

If news of the flight of the Prioress reaches the city of Worcester, a hundred tongues, spiteful, ignorant, curious, or merely idle, will at once start wagging.

Gallop, gallop, Shulamite!

How impossible to overtake a rumour, if it have an hour’s start of you.  As well attempt to catch up the water which first rushed through the sluice-gates, opened an hour before you reached the dam.

How impossible to remake a reputation once broken.  Before the priceless Venetian goblet fell from the table on to the flagged floor, one hand put forth in time might have hindered its fall.  But—­failing that timely hand—­when, a second later, it lies in a hundred pieces, the hands of the whole world are powerless to make it again as it was before it fell.

Faster, faster, Shulamite!

When the messenger of Mother Sub-Prioress reports the absence of the Bishop, he will most certainly be sent in haste to Father Benedict, who will experience a sinister joy at the prospect of following his long nose into the Prioress’s empty cell, who will scent out scandal where there is but a fragrance of lilies, and tear to pieces Mora’s reputation, with as little compunction as a wolf tears a lamb.

Gallop, gallop, Shulamite!  If no hand be put forth to save it, between Mother Sub-Prioress and Father Benedict, this crystal bowl will be broken into a hundred pieces.

At length the Bishop drew rein, and walked his mare a mile.  He had left Warwick ten miles behind him.  He would soon be half-way to Worcester.

He had left Warwick behind him!

It seemed to the Bishop that, ever since he had first known Mora de
Norelle, he had always been riding away and leaving behind.

For her sake he rode away, leaving behind the Court, his various offices, his growing influence and popularity.

For her sake he left his identity as Father Gervaise at the bottom of the ocean, taking up his life again, in Italy, under his other name.

For her sake, when he heard that she had entered the Convent of the White Ladies, he obtained the appointment to the see of Worcester, leaving the sunny land he loved, and the prospect of far higher preferment there.

And now for her sake he rode away from Warwick as fast as steed could carry him, leaving her the bride of another, in whose hand he had himself placed hers, pronouncing the Church’s blessing upon their union.