“Pooh!”
“Yes; the blessed Maria-Alphonzo de Liguori knew of the Pope’s death when he was far from Rome, at the moment when the holy Father expired, and there were many witnesses to the miracle. The reverend bishop, in a trance, heard the Pontiff’s last words, and repeated them to several persons. The messenger bringing the news did not arrive till thirty hours later—”
“Jesuit!” said Minoret with a smile; “I do not ask you for proofs; I ask you whether you believe it.”
“I believe that the apparition depends greatly on the person seeing it,” said the curé, still laughing at the sceptic.
“My dear friend, I am not laying a trap for you. What is your belief on this point?”
“I believe that the power of God is infinite,” replied the Abbé.
“When I die, if I am at peace with God, I will entreat Him to let me appear to you,” said the doctor, laughing.
“That is precisely the agreement made by Cardan with his friend,” replied the curé.
“Ursule,” said Minoret, “if ever a danger should threaten you, call me—I would come.”
“You have just put into simple words the touching elegy called ‘Néère,’ by André Chénier,” replied the curé. “But poets are great only because they know how to embody facts or feelings in perennially living forms.”
“Why do you talk of dying, my dear godfather?” said the young girl sadly. “We shall not die, we who are Christians; the grave is but the cradle of the soul.”
“Well, well,” said the doctor with a smile, “we are bound to quit this world, and when I am no more, you will be very much astonished at your fortune.”
“When you are no more, my kind friend, my only consolation will be to devote my life to you.”
“To me—when I am dead?”
“Yes. All the good works I may be able to do shall be done in your name to redeem your errors. I will pray to God day by day to persuade His infinite mercy not to punish eternally the faults of a day, but to give a place near to Himself among the spirits of the blest to a soul so noble and so pure as yours.”
This reply, spoken with angelic candor and in a tone of absolute conviction, confounded error, and converted Denis Minoret like another Saint Paul. A flash of internal light stunned him, and at the same time this tenderness, extending even to the life to come, brought tears to his eyes. This sudden effect of grace was almost electrical. The curé clasped his hands and stood up in his agitation. The child herself, surprised at her success, shed tears. The old man drew himself up as though someone had called him, looked into space as if he saw an aurora; then he knelt on his armchair, folded his hands, and cast down his eyes in deep humiliation.
“Great God!” he said, in a broken voice, and looking up to heaven, “if anyone can obtain my forgiveness, and lead me to Thee, is it not this spotless creature? Pardon my repentant old age, presented to Thee by this glorious child!”
He lifted up his soul in silence to God, beseeching Him to enlighten him by knowledge after having overwhelmed him by grace; then, turning to the curé, he held out his hand, saying:
“My dear father in God, I am a little child again. I am yours; I give my soul into your hands.”
Ursule kissed her godfather’s hands, covering them with tears of joy. The old man took her on his knee, gaily calling her his godmother. The curé, much moved, recited the “Veni Creator” in a sort of religious transport. This hymn was their evening prayer as the three Christians knelt together.
“What has happened?” asked La Bougival in astonishment.
“At last my godfather believes in God!” cried Ursule.
“And a good thing too; that was all that was wanting to make him perfect!” exclaimed the old peasant woman, crossing herself with simple gravity.
“My dear Doctor,” said the good priest, “you will soon have mastered the grandeur of religion and the necessity for its exercises; and you will find its philosophy, in so far as it is human, much loftier than that of the most daring minds.”
The curé, who displayed an almost childlike joy, then agreed to instruct the old man by meeting him as a catechumen twice a week.
Thus the conversion ascribed to Ursule and to a spirit of sordid self-interest had been spontaneous. The priest, who for fourteen years had restrained himself from touching the wounds in that heart, though he had deeply deplored them, had been appealed to, as we go to a surgeon when we feel an injury. Since that scene every evening Ursule’s prayers had become family prayers. Every moment the old man had felt peace growing upon him in the place of agitation. And viewing God as the responsible editor of inexplicable facts—as he put it—his mind was quite easy. His darling child told him that by this it could be seen that he was making progress in the kingdom of God.
Today, during the service, he had just read the prayers with the exercise of his understanding; for, in his first talk with the curé, he had risen to the divine idea of the communion of the faithful. The venerable neophyte had understood the eternal symbol connected with that nourishment, which faith makes necessary as soon as the whole, deep, glorious meaning of the symbol is thoroughly felt. If he had seemed in a hurry to get home, it was to thank his dear little goddaughter for having brought him to the Lord, to use the fine old-fashioned phrase. And so he had her on his knee in his drawing-room, and was kissing her solemnly on the brow, at the very moment when his heirs, defiling her holy influence by their ignoble alarms, were lavishing on Ursule the
