He must be a stiff, ungodly Protestant who can take anything but pleasure
in this kind and hopeful story. While he was thus near the subject, the
good father asked me if I were a Christian; and when he found I was not,
or not after his way, he glossed it over with great good-will.
The road which we were following, and which this stalwart father had made
with his own two hands within the space of a year, came to a corner, and
showed us some white buildings a little farther on beyond the wood. At
the same time, the bell once more sounded abroad. We were hard upon the
monastery. Father Apollinaris (for that was my companion's name) stopped
me.
'I must not speak to you down there,' he said. 'Ask for the Brother
Porter, and all will be well. But try to see me as you go out again
through the wood, where I may speak to you. I am charmed to have made
your acquaintance.'
And then suddenly raising his arms, flapping his fingers, and crying out
twice, 'I must not speak, I must not speak!' he ran away in front of me,
and disappeared into the monastery door.
