“I will tell you the whole truth,” Beatrice answered, resting her elbow upon the polished shelf and supporting her head in her hand, while she looked earnestly into Sister Paul’s faded eyes.

“Think well, my daughter.  I have no right to any confession from you.  If there is anything——­”

“Sister Paul—­you are a woman, and I must have a woman’s help.  I have learned something to-night which will change my whole life.  No—­do not be afraid—­I have done nothing wrong.  At least, I hope not.  While my father lived, I submitted.  I hoped, but I gave no sign.  I did not even write, as I once might have done.  I have often wished that I had—­was that wrong?”

“But you have told me nothing, dear child.  How can I answer you?” The nun was perplexed.

“True.  I will tell you.  Sister Paul—­I am five-and-twenty years old, I am a grown woman and this is no mere girl’s love story.  Seven years ago—­I was only eighteen then—­I was with my father as I have been ever since.  My mother had not been dead long then—­perhaps that is the reason why I seemed to be everything to my father.  But they had not been happy together, and I had loved her best.  We were travelling—­no matter where—­and then I met the man I have loved.  He was not of our country—­that is, of my father’s.  He was of the same people as my mother.  Well—­I loved him.  How dearly you must guess, and try to understand.  I could not tell you that.  No one could.  It began gradually, for he was often with us in those days.  My father liked him for his wit, his learning, though he was young; for his strength and manliness—­for a hundred reasons which were nothing to me.  I would have loved him had he been a cripple, poor, ignorant, despised, instead of being what he was—­the grandest, noblest man God ever made.  For I did not love him for his face, nor for his courtly ways, nor for such gifts as other men might have, but for himself and for his heart—­do you understand?”

“For his goodness,” said Sister Paul, nodding in approval.  “I understand.”

“No,” Beatrice answered, half impatiently.  “Not for his goodness either.  Many men are good, and so was he—­he must have been, of course.  No matter.  I loved him.  That is enough.  He loved me, too.  And one day we were alone, in the broad spring sun, upon a terrace.  There were lemon trees there—­I can see the place.  Then we told each other that we loved—­but neither of us could find the words—­they must be somewhere, those strong beautiful words that could tell how we loved.  We told each other—­”

“Without your father’s consent?” asked the nun almost severely.