, and you will not refuse me absolution! How
can you, when I say I am sorry for it? Yes, yes, I am!' The voice rose
to a low cry. 'Since you say it was a sin I repent, I will--what? You
are not in earnest, Father? Make restitution? Give the whole fortune
to a nun? Oh, no, no! You cannot expect me to do that! Rob my children
of what would have been theirs even if I had not taken the will? It is
out of the question, I tell you! Utterly out of the question! Besides,
it is not mine at all--I have not got a penny of it! It is all my
husband's and I cannot touch it--do you understand?'

Sister Giovanna had listened in spite of herself.

'The nun expects nothing and does not want the money,' she said,
bending down. 'Try to rest now, for you are very tired.'

'Rest?' cried the Princess, starting up in bed and leaning on one
hand. 'How can I rest when it torments me day and night? I come to you
for absolution and you refuse it, and tell me to rest!'

She broke into a wild laugh again, but Sister Giovanna instantly
seized her arm as she had done before, and spoke in the same
commanding way.

'Be silent!' she said energetically.

The delirious woman began to whine.

'You are so rough, Father--so unkind to-day! What is the matter with
you? You never treated me like this before!'

She was sobbing the next moment, and real tears trickled through her
fingers as she covered her face with her hands.

'You see--how--how penitent I am!' she managed to cry in a broken voice.
'Have pity, Father!'

She was crying bitterly, but though she was out of her mind the nun
could not help feeling that she was acting a part, even in her
delirium, and in spite of the tears that forced themselves through her
hands and ran down, wetting the lace and spotting the scarlet ribbons
of her elaborate nightdress. Sister Giovanna put aside the thought as
a possibly unjust judgment, and tried to quiet her.

'If you are really sorry for what you did, you will be forgiven,' said
the nun.

This produced an immediate effect: the sobbing subsided, the tears
ceased to flow, and the Princess repeated the Act of Contrition in a
low voice; then she folded her hands and waited in silence. Sister
Giovanna stood upright beside the pillows, and prayed very earnestly
in her heart that she might forget what she had heard, or at least
bear her aunt no grudge for the irreparable wrong.

But the delirious woman, who still fancied that her nurse was her
confessor,