t it to a successful
issue.

The curtains of the room was half closed, and admitted only a doubtful
light to the bed on which Rodin was lying. The Jesuit's features had lost
the greenish hue peculiar to cholera patients, but remained perfectly
livid and cadaverous, and so thin, that the dry, rugged skin appeared to
cling to the smallest prominence of bone. The muscles and veins of the
long, lean, vulture-like neck resembled a bundle of cords. The head,
covered with an old, black, filthy nightcap, from beneath which strayed a
few thin, gray hairs, rested upon a dirty pillow; for Rodin would not
allow them to change his linen. His iron-gray beard had not been shaved
for some time, and stood out like the hairs of a brush. Under his shirt
he wore an old flannel waistcoat full of holes. He had one of his arms
out of bed, and his bony hairy hand, with its bluish nails, held fast a
cotton handkerchief of indescribable color.

You might have taken him for a corpse, had it not been for the two
brilliant sparks which still burned in the depths of his eyes. In that
look, in which seemed concentrated all the remaining life and energy of
the man, you might read the most restless anxiety. Sometimes his features
revealed the sharpest pangs; sometimes the twisting of his hands, and his
sudden starts, proclaimed his despair at being thus fettered to a bed of
pain, whilst the serious interests which he had in charge required all
the activity of his mind. Thus, with thoughts continually on the stretch,
his mind often wandered, and he had fits of delirium, from which he woke
as from a painful dream. By the prudent advice of Dr. Baleinier, who
considered him not in a state to attend to matters of--importance, Father
d'Aigrigny had hitherto evaded Rodin's questions with regard to the
Rennepont affair, which he dreaded to see lost and ruined in consequence
of his forced inaction. The silence of Father d'Aigrigny on this head,
and the ignorance in which they kept him, only augmented the sick man's
exasperation. Such was the moral and physical state of Rodin, when
Cardinal Malipieri entered his chamber against his will.

CHAPTER XXVII.

THE LURE.

To understand fully the tortures of Rodin, reduced to inactivity by
sickness, and to explain the importance of Cardinal Malipieri's visit, we
must remember the audacious views of the ambitious Jesuit, who believed
himself following in the steps of Sixtus V., and expected to become his
equa