“But there you are mistaken!” he said gently, with a smile that was almost paternal.  “I know of nothing in recent years that has given the Holy Father greater satisfaction!”

She glanced at him quickly but said nothing, whereat he was secretly annoyed.  Why did she not express her wonder and delight at the Pope’s lenity, as almost any other woman in her position would have done?  Her outward appearance was that of child-like ultra-femininity,—­how was it then that he felt as if she were mentally fencing with him, and that her intellectual sword-play threatened to surpass his own?

“Nothing,” he repeated suavely, “has given the Holy Father greater satisfaction!  For very naturally, he looks upon you as one of his most faithful children, and rejoices that by the power of perfect love—­love which is an emanation of the Divine Spirit in itself—­you have been chosen by our Lord to draw so gifted and brilliant a man as Aubrey Leigh out of the error of his ways and bring him into the true fold!”

XXXIV.

Still the Countess Sylvie was silent.  Bending a quick scrutinising glance upon her, he saw that her eyes were lowered, and that the violets nestling near her bosom moved restlessly with her quickened breath, and he judged these little signs of agitation as the favourable hints of a weakening and hesitating will.

“Aubrey Leigh,” he went on slowly, “has long been an avowed enemy of our Church.  In England especially, where many of the Protestant clergy, repenting of their recusancy—­for Protestantism is nothing more than a backsliding from the true faith—­are desirous of gradually, through the gentler forms of Ritualism, returning to the Original source of Divine Inspiration, he has taken a great deal too much upon himself in the freedom of his speeches to the people.  But we are bound to remember that it is not against our Church only that he has armed himself at all points, but seemingly against all Churches; and when we examine, charitably and with patience, into the sum and substance of his work and aim, we find its chief object is to purify and maintain—­not to destroy or deny—­the Divine teaching of Christ.  In this desire we are one with him—­we are even willing to assist him in the Cause he has espoused—­and we shall faithfully promise to do so, when we receive him as your husband.  Nay, more—­we will endeavour to further his work among the poor, and carry out any scheme for their better care, which he may propose to us, and we may judge as devout and serviceable.  The Church has wide arms,—­she stretches far, and holds fast!  The very fact of a man like Aubrey Leigh voluntarily choosing as his wife the last scion of one of the most staunch Roman Catholic families in Europe, proves the salutary and welcome change which your good influence has brought about in his heart and mind and manner and judgment,—­ wherefore it follows, my dear child, that in his marriage with you he becomes one of us, and is no longer outside us!”