"Well, no, I believe I'm not. I haven't the least idea he would do. He belongs to the church militant. He came to me with the model of a breech-loading cannon he's invented, and he wanted a passport to go to America, so that he might offer his cannon to our government."
"How curious!" said Mrs. Vervain, and her daughter looked frankly into Ferris's face. "But I know; it's one of your jokes."
"You overpraise me, Mrs. Vervain. If I could make such jokes as that priest was, I should set up for a humorist at once. He had the touch of pathos that they say all true pieces of humor ought to have," he went on instinctively addressing himself to Miss Vervain, who did not repulse him. "He made me melancholy; and his face haunts me. I should like to paint him. Priests are generally such a snuffy, common lot. And I dare say," he concluded, "he's sufficiently commonplace, too, though he didn't look it. Spare your romance, Miss Vervain."
The young lady blushed resentfully. "I see as little romance as joke in it," she said.
"It was a cannon," returned Ferris, without taking any notice of her, and with a sort of absent laugh, "that would make it very lively for the Southerners--if they had it. Poor fellow! I suppose he came with high hopes of me, and expected me to receive his invention with eloquent praises. I've no doubt he figured himself furnished not only with a passport, but with a letter from me to President Lincoln, and foresaw his own triumphal entry into Washington, and his honorable interviews with the admiring generals of the Union forces, to whom he should display his wonderful cannon. Too bad; isn't it?"
"And why didn't you give him the passport and the letter?" asked Mrs. Vervain.
"Oh, that's a state secret," returned Ferris.
"And you think he won't do for our purpose?"
"Well, I'm not so sure of it. Tell me something more about him."
"I don't know anything more about him. Besides, there isn't time."
The gondola had already entered the canal, and was swiftly approaching the hotel.
"Oh yes, there is," pleaded Mrs. Vervain, laying her hand on his arm. "I want you to come in and dine with us. We dine early."
"Thank you, I can't. Affairs of the nation, you know. Rebel privateer on the canal of the Brenta."