The Bishop looked searchingly into the ferrety face of Mother Sub-Prioress, but he saw naught there save genuine distress and perplexity.

He looked at the massive door, and at the excited crowd of nuns.  He even gave himself time to note that the nose and lip of Seraphine were beginning to swell, and to experience a whimsical wish that the Knight could see her.

Then his calm, observant eye turned again to Mother Sub-Prioress.

“And why do you make so sure, Mother Sub-Prioress, that the Reverend Mother is indeed within her cell?”

“Because we know her to be,” replied Mother Sub-Prioress, as tartly as she dared, when addressing the Lord Bishop.  “Permit me, Reverend Father, to recount to you the happenings of the last twenty hours.

“Soon after her return from Vespers, yestereven, the Reverend Mother sent word by Mary Antony that she purposed again spending the night in prayer and vigil, and would not be present at the evening meal; also that she must not, on any account whatever, be disturbed.  Mary Antony took this message to the kitchens, bidding the younger lay-sisters to prepare the meal without her, saying she cared not how badly it was served, seeing the Reverend Mother would not be there to partake of it.”

Mother Sub-Prioress paused to sniff, and to give the other nuns an opportunity for ejaculations concerning Sister Antony.  But their awe of the Lord Bishop, and their genuine anxiety for the old lay-sister, kept them silent.

The Bishop stroked his chin, keeping the corners of his mouth firmly in place by means of his thumb and finger.  Old Antony was delectably funny when she said these things herself; but she was delectably funnier, when her remarks were repeated by Mother Sub-Prioress.

“The old creature,” continued Mother Sub-Prioress, eyeing the Bishop’s meditative hand suspiciously, “then betook herself to the outer gates, told the porteress that she had your orders, Reverend Father, to report to you if the Reverend Mother again elected to pass a night in vigil and in fasting, because you and she—­you and she forsooth!—­were made anxious by the too constant fasting and the too prolonged vigils of the Reverend Mother.  Mary Mark very properly refused to allow the old”——­

“Lay-sister,” interposed the Bishop, sternly.

Mother Sub-Prioress gasped; then made obeisance:—­“the old lay-sister to leave the Convent.  Whereupon Sister Antony sent Mary Mark to deliver the Reverend Mother’s message to me, bribing her, with the promise of a gift from you, my lord, to leave her the key.  When the porteress returned, Mary Antony was gone, having left the great doors ajar, and the key within the lock.  She has not been seen since.  Did she reach the Palace, and speak with you, my lord?  Is she now in safety at the Palace?”

“Nay,” said the Bishop gravely.  “Sister Mary Antony hath not been seen at the Palace.”