ht words of Mona.

Whoever the suitor might be, Arthur did not appear to her as a lover. So
careful had he been in his behavior, that Louis would have as much place
in her thought as Arthur, who had never discouraged her hope of the
convent, except by pleading for Ireland. The delay in keeping her own
resolution had been pleasant. Now that the date was fixed, the grateful
enclosure of the cloister seemed to shut her in from all this dust and
clamor of men, from the noisome sights and sounds of world-living, from
the endless coming and going and running about, concerning trifles, from
the injustice and meanness and hopeless crimes of men.

In the shade of the altar, in the restful gloom of Calvary, she could
look up with untired eyes to the calm glow of the celestial life,
unchanging, orderly, beautiful with its satisfied aspiration, and rich
in perfect love and holy companionship. Such a longing came over her to
walk into this perfect peace that moment! Mona well knew this mood, and
Louis in triumph signalled his sister to look. Her eyes, turned to the
rocky shore of Valcour, saw far beyond. On her perfect face lay a
shadow, the shadow of her longing, and from her lips came now and then
the perfume of a sigh.

In silence these two watched her, Louis recognizing the borderland of
holy ecstasy, Mona hopeful that the vision was only a mirage. The boat
floated close to the perpendicular rocks and reflected itself in the
deep waters; far away the farmhouse lay against the green woods; to the
north rose the highest point of the bluff, dark with pines; farther on
was the sweep of the curved shore, and still farther the red walls of
the town. Never boat carried freight so beautiful as this which bore
along the island the young mother, the young deacon, and deep-hearted
Honora, who was blessing God.

CHAPTER XXXII.

THE PAULINE PRIVILEGE.

For a week at the end of July Arthur had been in the city closing up the
Curran episode. On his return every one felt that change of marked and
mysterious kind had touched him. His face shone with joy. The brooding
shadow, acquired in his exile, had disappeared. Light played about his
face, emanated from it, as from moonlit water, a phosphorescence of the
daylight. His mother studied him with anxiety, without which she had not
been since the surprising visit of Curran. The old shadow seemed to have
fled forever.

One night on the lake, as Louis and he floated lazily towards the