An hour later the following note was left at the Hotel de la Poste:--
Mademoiselle,--I am told that you desire to see me, but that you do not know how to accomplish it. Nothing is easier. Ring the door-bell of my quiet house, ask to see me, and do not be alarmed at my black robe and aged face. I am not one of those who force their advice upon pretty young women who do not ask for it, and who may become in time greater saints than I. That is the whole mystery of obtaining an interview with Mother Marie-des-Anges, who salutes you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. [Picture of small cross.]
An invitation so graciously given was not to be resisted; and Mademoiselle Antonia, after putting on the soberest costume she could get together, went to the convent.
I wish I could give you the details of that interview, which must have been curious; but no one was present, and nothing was known except what the lost sheep, who returned in tears, told of it. When the journalist tried to joke her on this conversion, Mademoiselle Antonia turned upon him.
“Hold your tongue,” she said; “you never in your life wrote a sentence like what she said to me.”
“‘Go, my child,’ said that old woman, ‘the ways of God are beautiful, and little known; there is often more of a saint in a Magdalen than in a nun.’”
The journalist laughed, but scenting danger he said,--
“When are you going again to Gondreville to see that Keller? If he doesn’t pay the money soon, I’ll hit him a blow in some article, in spite of all Maxime may say.”
“I don’t play dirty tricks myself,” replied Antonia, with dignity.
“Don’t you? Do you mean you are not going to present that note again?”
“Not now,” replied the admirer and probably the echo of Mother Marie-des-Anges, but using her own language; “I don’t blackmail a family in affliction. I should remember it on my death-bed, and doubt God’s mercy.”
“Why don’t you make yourself an Ursuline, now that we are here?”
“Ha, if I only had the courage! I might be happier if I did. But, in any case, I am not going to Gondreville; Mother Marie-des-Anges has undertaken to arrange that matter for me.”
“Foolish girl! Have you given her that note?”
“I wanted to tear it up, but she prevented me, and told me to give it to her and she would arrange it honestly for my interests.”