"None of your Jesuitical conundrums for me, sir. Two persons can never have the same will." "Yes they can, Baroness, by the help of God: but this wonderful secret is discovered only by those to whom he has given the grace of a vocation to the religious life." At this moment the Baroness's maid entered the room with a long flaring tallow-candle, to light her lady to bed. "What! Mrs. Kay, am I to go to bed before my company have left me?" "As you please, my lady." "Well, I don't please to leave Lady De Grey." But the old lady was at length persuaded to go to bed, on the promise that Geraldine would visit her when there, and join in the litany, which her maid repeated, and she responded to, every night, "for a happy death." Nothing could exceed the devotion with which the Baroness repeated the words "Merciful Jesus have mercy on me;" and moved to a warmer feeling of regard and respect than she had yet entertained, our heroine, at the close of the litany, besought her blessing, and retired, just as her carriage was announced below. CHAPTER XV. Ah! torture not the fluttering heart "I CAN wait no longer," said Geraldine on the following morning, as a light double rap was heard at the hall door; "I begin to feel either a presentiment or nervous apprehension of being altogether detained; and if my future sisters arrive not by their own appointment, I shall linger here no more." As the footsteps approached, her heart beat, and a sickening dread overcame her, as she turned expecting to see her father; but the visitor was Mr. Everard. His step,--so unlike his usual rapid tread, that she had mistaken it for that of General Carrington,— bespoke the dejection of his heart. He took Geraldine's offered hand, and continued to hold it, as he sat beside her in silence: at length releasing it with a slight movement of irritation, he said, "I have lived too long." "Ah no!" cried Geraldine, moved by the affliction of this old and faithful friend; and she hastened to console him for her loss, by a picture of the happiness she would enjoy, and by the promise to nurse him on his dying bed, should life and health be granted her; but Mr. Everard not only grieved for her loss, but was vexed that she could not remain a quiet rational Catholic, enjoying the many blessings God had given her, and dispensing good to all around her, as the widow of him whose noble name she bore; and the more he spoke, the more irritated he became, so that at length telling her he had no patience with her folly, and that his heart was breaking, he sank into silence, which Geraldine knew not how to break. She continued therefore to sit by this attached and beloved old friend, in silence like his own. He had not changed, but they could no longer sympathize, for she had been led by the grace of God beyond his spiritual experience, and he looked on her as on a dreamer. Still he sighed, for her dreams, he admitted, gave her a joy which he fain would have shared. Geraldine also pondered, and she also sighed, but her sigh was not for herself, and to the sigh succeeded a bright and grateful smile as she looked up to her future home. The presence of Mr. Everard reminded her of those who had been deputed by God to aid her in her path towards Him, without any consciousness, on their part, that they were to work only for a limited time. Her uncles had each in her childhood assisted her religious attainment. The Warden by theological instructions, the humble vicar by the living sermons of his example. Her first governess had, with the Warden, impressed her with a deep sense of the respect due to the visible Church; her last governess, with her uncle Edmund, of the life hidden with Christ in God. When she began to feel that each principle might assist instead of opposing the other, and to perceive that they were parts taken from a whole, Mr. Everard assisted her to enter the Catholic Church, and she was then given, and she truly believed by the same guiding hand, to Sir Eustace De Grey. Geraldine in this retrospect acknowledged that she was not, at the time of her conversion, sufficiently matured in Catholicity, to have embraced the religious state; for although she possessed more knowledge than many of its children of the vast treasures of the Church, it required the constant example of one congenial to her, for the prac tical working of Catholic truth to be received by such a high-spirited and fondly indulged creature as Geraldine Carrington. But Eustace De Grey had well fulfilled the part assigned him; and then, his task accomplished, he too had been withdrawn, and his cherished pupil left to encounter the solitudes of the religious life. She was again lost in wonder, love, and praise! The long silence was at length broken by Mr. Everard's giving fresh vent to his disappointment, that, on becoming a Catholic, she had not filled that post which he esteemed so useful, so essential, for the mutual good understanding of both parties, that of a moderate liberal Catholic, for the conciliation of Protestants. "Mr. Everard," said Geraldine, smiling, "I do not consider the conciliation of Protestants to be my primary duty. Truly grateful shall I be, if in following the dictates of my conscience, I soothe instead of alienating the devout of that body, but never by the grace of God will I take any step, or be withheld from taking it, by that sole motive. 'Explanation, not concession,' was Eustace De Grey's motto; and like him, I am ever ready to give the former, however wearied by the repetition of questions, which for three hundred years have been answered." "Well!" sighed Mr. Everard, "we must all save our souls in the manner our conscience dictates, and certainly if you insist on being a nun, you could not have chosen an order less objectionable. The order of our Lady of Mercy should not be termed a new order, for it is very ancient, and has never become obsolete. The duties only have varied with the necessities of the times. When it was founded by James the First, of Arragon, in consequence of a vow made during captivity, the brothers, in addition to the usual vows, took that of redeeming captives, and the heroic deeds of those holy men, must inspire respect amongst Protestants as well as Catholics. In the present day, the Brothers of Mercy, who are mostly settled in Germany, attend prisons, hospitals, and poor schools; performing the same good works as Les Sœurs Grises, and the Sisters of Charity. I am well pleased that a female community should bear the sweet name of Mercy, which I am surprised should not have been the case long ere this." "There is in Rome," said Geraldine, "a female community, entitled 'Le Sorelle della Misericordia.' I went with the Contessa to visit their convent, or, as it is always termed in Italy, their monastery; and also saw their hospital, with which I was delighted; and just such a hospital, where within the enclosure the sick and dying are watched day and night by the appointed sisters, I trust to see erected with the convent, in the great court of the abbey ruin." 6 "But why," said Mr. Everard, "can you not be satisfied to be a benefactress to this order, and yet keep your usual habits of life? for let me tell you, that all the sensible rational Catholics, are as much, if not more annoyed, than your Protestant friends, by the imprudent ardour of your conduct. Why,' say they, can she not remain in the same position of life she filled, before she embraced Catholicity? Why is she to rush on to a state not required by the Church, and strengthen the notion which Protestants entertain, that we are always in the clouds, and are never guided by common-sense in anything?'" 66 6 My dear friend," said Geraldine, "I trust, by the grace of God, to act more generously towards Him, than your timid or tepid Catholic critics would have done. In fact, had I listened to the worldlywise counsels I have received during my Catholic life, I should not only have resisted the grace of God, but greatly disedified my pious Protestant |