"The little brothers are never absent, Agostino."
"This brother was a big brother," said I.
"It is not seemly to make jest of holy men," she reproved me in her
chilling voice.
"I had no thought to jest," I answered soberly. "I should never have
remarked this friar but that he gazed upon me with so great an intentness--
so great that I was unable to bear it."
It was her turn to betray emotion. She looked at me full and long--for
once--and very searchingly. She, too, had grown paler than was her habit.
"Agostino, what do you tell me?" quoth she, and her voice quivered.
Now here was a deal of pother about a capuchin who had stared at the
Madonnino of Anguissola! The matter was out of all proportion to the stir
it made, and I conveyed in my next words some notion of that opinion.
But she stared wistfully. "Never think it, Agostino," she besought me.
"You know not what it may import." And then she turned to Fra Gervasio.
"Who was this mendicant?" she asked.
He had by now recovered from his erstwhile confusion. But he was still
pale, and I observed that his hand trembled.
"He must have been one of the two little brothers of St. Francis on their
way, they said, from Milan to Loreto on a pilgrimage."
"Not those you told me are resting here until tomorrow?"
From his face I saw that he would have denied it had it lain within his
power to utter a deliberate falsehood.
Pages:
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70