said he.

"Of whom do you speak, my son?" inquired the priest.

"Of that sweet girl," answered Kenyon, "who knelt to you at the
confessional. Surely you remember her, among all the mortals to whose
confessions you have listened! For she alone could have had no sins to
reveal."

"Yes; I remember," said the priest, with a gleam of recollection in his
eyes. "She was made to bear a miraculous testimony to the efficacy of
the divine ordinances of the Church, by seizing forcibly upon one of
them, and finding immediate relief from it, heretic though she was.
It is my purpose to publish a brief narrative of this miracle, for
the edification of mankind, in Latin, Italian, and English, from the
printing press of the Propaganda. Poor child! Setting apart her heresy,
she was spotless, as you say. And is she dead?"

"Heaven forbid, father!" exclaimed Kenyon, shrinking back. "But she has
gone from me, I know not whither. It may be--yes, the idea seizes upon
my mind--that what she revealed to you will suggest some clew to the
mystery of her disappearance.'"

"None, my son, none," answered the priest, shaking his head;
"nevertheless, I bid you be of good cheer. That young maiden is not
doomed to die a heretic. Who knows what the Blessed Virgin may at this
moment be doing for her soul! Perhaps, when you next behold her, she
will be clad in the shining white robe of the true faith."

This latter suggestion did not convey all the comfort which the old
priest possibly intended by it; but he imparted it to the sculptor,
along with his blessing, as the two best things that he could bestow,
and said nothing further, except to bid him farewell.

When they had parted, however, the idea of Hilda's conversion to
Catholicism recurred to her lover's mind, bringing with it certain
reflections, that gave a new turn to his surmises about the mystery into
which she had vanished. Not that he seriously apprehended--although
the superabundance of her religious sentiment might mislead her for
a moment--that the New England girl would permanently succumb to the
scarlet superstitions which surrounded her in Italy. But the incident
of the confessional if known, as probably it was, to the eager
propagandists who prowl about for souls, as cats to catch a mouse--would
surely inspire the most confident expectations of bringing her over to
the faith. With so pious an end in view, would Jesuitical morality be
shocked at the thought of kidnapping the mortal