The Gadfly Part 7

"If you put it that way, of course I shall be very grateful for your guidance."

"Then you will come to me next month? That's right. And run in to see me, my lad, when you have time any evening."

Shortly before Easter Montanelli's appointment to the little see of Brisigh.e.l.la, in the Etruscan Apennines, was officially announced. He wrote to Arthur from Rome in a cheerful and tranquil spirit; evidently his depression was pa.s.sing over. "You must come to see me every vacation," he wrote; "and I shall often be coming to Pisa; so I hope to see a good deal of you, if not so much as I should wish."

Dr. Warren had invited Arthur to spend the Easter holidays with him and his children, instead of in the dreary, rat-ridden old place where Julia now reigned supreme. Enclosed in the letter was a short note, scrawled in Gemma's childish, irregular handwriting, begging him to come if possible, "as I want to talk to you about something." Still more encouraging was the whispered communication pa.s.sing around from student to student in the university; everyone was to be prepared for great things after Easter.

All this had put Arthur into a state of rapturous antic.i.p.ation, in which the wildest improbabilities hinted at among the students seemed to him natural and likely to be realized within the next two months.

He arranged to go home on Thursday in Pa.s.sion week, and to spend the first days of the vacation there, that the pleasure of visiting the Warrens and the delight of seeing Gemma might not unfit him for the solemn religious meditation demanded by the Church from all her children at this season. He wrote to Gemma, promising to come on Easter Monday; and went up to his bedroom on Wednesday night with a soul at peace.

He knelt down before the crucifix. Father Cardi had promised to receive him in the morning; and for this, his last confession before the Easter communion, he must prepare himself by long and earnest prayer. Kneeling with clasped hands and bent head, he looked back over the month, and reckoned up the miniature sins of impatience, carelessness, hastiness of temper, which had left their faint, small spots upon the whiteness of his soul. Beyond these he could find nothing; in this month he had been too happy to sin much. He crossed himself, and, rising, began to undress.

As he unfastened his shirt a sc.r.a.p of paper slipped from it and fluttered to the floor. It was Gemma's letter, which he had worn all day upon his neck. He picked it up, unfolded it, and kissed the dear scribble; then began folding the paper up again, with a dim consciousness of having done something very ridiculous, when he noticed on the back of the sheet a postscript which he had not read before.

"Be sure and come as soon as possible," it ran, "for I want you to meet Bolla. He has been staying here, and we have read together every day."

The hot colour went up to Arthur's forehead as he read.

Always Bolla! What was he doing in Leghorn again? And why should Gemma want to read with him? Had he bewitched her with his smuggling? It had been quite easy to see at the meeting in January that he was in love with her; that was why he had been so earnest over his propaganda. And now he was close to her--reading with her every day.

Arthur suddenly threw the letter aside and knelt down again before the crucifix. And this was the soul that was preparing for absolution, for the Easter sacrament--the soul at peace with G.o.d and itself and all the world! A soul capable of sordid jealousies and suspicions; of selfish animosities and ungenerous hatred--and against a comrade! He covered his face with both hands in bitter humiliation. Only five minutes ago he had been dreaming of martyrdom; and now he had been guilty of a mean and petty thought like this!

When he entered the seminary chapel on Thursday morning he found Father Cardi alone. After repeating the Confiteor, he plunged at once into the subject of his last night's backsliding.

"My father, I accuse myself of the sins of jealousy and anger, and of unworthy thoughts against one who has done me no wrong."

Farther Cardi knew quite well with what kind of penitent he had to deal.

He only said softly:

"You have not told me all, my son."

"Father, the man against whom I have thought an unchristian thought is one whom I am especially bound to love and honour."

"One to whom you are bound by ties of blood?"

"By a still closer tie."

"By what tie, my son?"

"By that of comradeship."

"Comradeship in what?"

"In a great and holy work."

A little pause.

"And your anger against this--comrade, your jealousy of him, was called forth by his success in that work being greater than yours?"

"I--yes, partly. I envied him his experience--his usefulness. And then--I thought--I feared--that he would take from me the heart of the girl I--love."

"And this girl that you love, is she a daughter of the Holy Church?"

"No; she is a Protestant."

"A heretic?"

Arthur clasped his hands in great distress. "Yes, a heretic," he repeated. "We were brought up together; our mothers were friends--and I--envied him, because I saw that he loves her, too, and because--because----"

"My son," said Father Cardi, speaking after a moment's silence, slowly and gravely, "you have still not told me all; there is more than this upon your soul."

"Father, I----" He faltered and broke off again.

The priest waited silently.

"I envied him because the society--the Young Italy--that I belong to------"

"Yes?"

"Intrusted him with a work that I had hoped--would be given to me, that I had thought myself--specially adapted for."

"What work?"

"The taking in of books--political books--from the steamers that bring them--and finding a hiding place for them--in the town------"

"And this work was given by the party to your rival?"

"To Bolla--and I envied him."

"And he gave you no cause for this feeling? You do not accuse him of having neglected the mission intrusted to him?"

"No, father; he has worked bravely and devotedly; he is a true patriot and has deserved nothing but love and respect from me."

Father Cardi pondered.

"My son, if there is within you a new light, a dream of some great work to be accomplished for your fellow-men, a hope that shall lighten the burdens of the weary and oppressed, take heed how you deal with the most precious blessing of G.o.d. All good things are of His giving; and of His giving is the new birth. If you have found the way of sacrifice, the way that leads to peace; if you have joined with loving comrades to bring deliverance to them that weep and mourn in secret; then see to it that your soul be free from envy and pa.s.sion and your heart as an altar where the sacred fire burns eternally. Remember that this is a high and holy thing, and that the heart which would receive it must be purified from every selfish thought. This vocation is as the vocation of a priest; it is not for the love of a woman, nor for the moment of a fleeting pa.s.sion; it is FOR G.o.d AND THE PEOPLE; it is NOW AND FOREVER."

"Ah!" Arthur started and clasped his hands; he had almost burst out sobbing at the motto. "Father, you give us the sanction of the Church!

Christ is on our side----"

"My son," the priest answered solemnly, "Christ drove the moneychangers out of the Temple, for His House shall be called a House of Prayer, and they had made it a den of thieves."

After a long silence, Arthur whispered tremulously:

"And Italy shall be His Temple when they are driven out----"

He stopped; and the soft answer came back: