A few minutes’ more conversation,—­then a hurried consultation with Madame Bozier, and Sylvie, changing her lace gown for a simple travelling dress, walked out of the Casa D’Angeli with the faithful Katrine, and taking the first carriage she could find, was driven to the Palazzo where the Princesse D’Agramont had her apartments.  Allowing from ten to fifteen minutes to elapse after her departure, Aubrey Leigh himself went out, and standing on the steps of the house, looked up and down carelessly, drawing on his gloves and humming a tune.  His quick glance soon espied what he had been almost certain he should see, namely, the straight black-garmented figure of a priest, walking slowly along the street on the opposite side, his hands clasped behind his back, and his whole aspect indicative of devout meditation.

“I thought so!” said Aubrey to himself.  “A spy set on already!  No time to lose—­Cardinal Bonpre must leave Rome at nightfall.”

Leisurely he crossed the road, and walking with as slow a step as the priest he had noticed, came opposite to him face to face.  With impenetrable solemnity the holy man meekly moved aside,—­with equally impenetrable coolness, Aubrey eyed him up and down, then the two passed each other, and Aubrey walked with the same unhasting pace, to the end of the street,—­then turned—­to see that the priest had paused in his holy musings to crane his neck after him and watch him with the most eager scrutiny.  He did not therefore take a carriage at the moment he intended, but walked on into the Corso,—­ there he sprang into a fiacre and drove straight to the Sovrani Palace.  The first figure he saw there, strolling about in the front of the building, was another priest, absorbed in apparently profound thoughts on the sublimity of the sunset, which was just then casting its red glow over the Eternal City.  And with the appearance of this second emissary of the Vatican police, he realised the full significance of the existing position of affairs.

Without a moment’s loss of time he was ushered into the presence of the Cardinal, and there for a moment stood silent on the threshold of the apartment, overcome by the noble aspect of the venerable prelate, who, seated in his great oaken chair, was listening to a part of the Gospel of Saint Luke, read aloud in clear sweet accents by Manuel.

“A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil; for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh.

“And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?

“Whosoever cometh to me, and heareth my sayings, and doeth them, I will show you to whom he is like: 

“He is like a man which built an house, and digged deep, and laid the foundation on a rock:  and when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and could not shake it:  for it was founded upon a rock.