for that reason I should
certainly not wish you to become a believing Catholic. As to driving you
from home--"

"Perhaps I had better leave before being driven away?"

So saying, Jeanne took Noemi's arm. Carlino begged them to walk round
the Lac d'Amour. Who knows, perhaps the little window in heaven would
open. He wished it would. Noemi, recalling the conversation of a few
hours before, expressed a doubt that Fomalhaut would be the star to
appear at the window.

"To be sure," said Carlino thoughtfully. "I had forgotten Fomalhaut. If
it is not Fomalhaut now, it will be Fomalhaut then."

But Noemi had other difficulties to suggest. What if no star appeared at
the window, either large or small? For this difficulty Carlino promptly
found a remedy. The star will be there. It may be minute, lost in an
immense profundity, but it will be there. The girl does not see it,
but the priest sees it with the long-sightedness of decrepitude. Later,
through faith, the girl discerns it also.

"And so the poor girl," said Jeanne bitterly, "relying on the faith of
an old, dim-sighted priest, will see stars where there are none, will
lose her common-sense, her youth, her life, her all. I suppose you will
end by having her buried at the Beguinage?"

And she went on with Noemi without waiting for an answer.

They had now walked round the Lac d'Amour, and the two friends paused
for some time on the other bridge. But no little window opened in the
heavens. The great distant tower of the Halles, the enormous campanile
of Notre Dame, a squat tower near the pond, the pointed roofs of the
Beguinage stood outlined against the milky clouds, like a venerable
assembly of old men. Carlino, not knowing what better to do, began
discoursing in a loud voice on the most appropriate position for his
window.

"What day is this?" Jeanne asked her friend under her breath.

"Saturday."

"To-morrow I will speak to Carlino, Monday and Tuesday we will settle
our affairs, Wednesday we will pack our boxes, and Thursday we will
start. You can write to your sister that we shall be at Subiaco the week
after next."

"Don't decide so suddenly. Think about it."

"I have decided. I must know. If it is he, I will not be a hindrance in
his path. But I wish to see him." "We will talk it over again to morrow,
Jeanne. Do not decide yet."

"I have thought it over, and I have made up my mind."

Midnight sounded from the great tower of the Halles. High up in the