"Listen a moment, it is so astonishing--so astonishing and providential! He also spoke to me about my father; it seems he knew him formerly."
"Your father, uncle? But that is no reason for receiving a Jesuit."
"I know that, but I was very ill, and he looked after me most devotedly all night long. He was perfect; no doubt he saved my life; those men are all a little bit of a doctor."
"Oh! he looked after you all night? But you said just now that he had only been gone a very short time."
"That is quite true; I kept him to breakfast after all his kindness. He had it at a table by my bedside while I drank a cup of tea."
My uncle looked vexed, as if I had said something very much out of place, and then added:
"Don't joke, Gaston; such things are out of place at times. He has shown me more devotion than many a relation would have done, and I expect to have his convictions respected."
This rather upset me, but I answered, nevertheless: "Very well, uncle; and what did you do after breakfast?"
"We played a game of bezique, and then he repeated his breviary while I read a little book which he happened to have in his pocket, and which was not by any means badly written."
"Yes, and no, or rather--no. It is the history of their missions in Central Africa, and is rather a book of travels and adventures. What these men have done is very grand."
I began to feel that matters were going badly, so I got up. "Well, good-bye, uncle," I said, "I see you are going to leave Freemasonry for religion; you are a renegade."
He was still rather confused, and stammered:
"Well, but religion is a sort of Freemasonry."
"When is your Jesuit coming back?" I asked.
"I don't--I don't know exactly; to-morrow, perhaps; but it is not certain."
My joke turned out very badly for me! My uncle became radically converted, and if that had been all I should not have cared so much. Clerical or Freemason, to me it is all the same; six of one and half-a-dozen of the other; but the worst of it is that he has just made his will--yes, made his will--and he has disinherited me in favor of that rascally Jesuit!
My dear friend, you cannot understand it by any possible means, you say, and I perfectly believe you. You think I am going mad? It may be so, but not for the reasons which you suppose.