saying, 'Won't you give me
something for my poor people?' Now, Mother, isn't the story a
wonderful one? for there was genius in this woman, though it was only
for begging: a tall, thin, curious, fantastic figure, considered
simple by some, but gifted for her task which had been revealed to
her in middle age."

"But why, Evelyn, does that seem to you so strange that her task
should have been revealed to her in middle age?"

Evelyn looked at the Reverend Mother for a while unable to answer,
then went on suddenly with her tale, telling how that day, at that
very regatta, a man had slapped Jeanne in the face, and she had
answered, "You are perfectly right, a box on the ears is just what
is suited to me; but now tell me what you are going to give me for
my poor people." At another part of the ground somebody had begun to
tease her--some young man, no doubt, in a long fashionable grey
frock-coat with race-glasses hung round his neck, had ventured to
tease this noble woman, to twit her, to jeer and jibe at her
uncouthness, for she was uncouth, and she stood bearing with these
jeers until they apologised to her. "Never mind the apology," she
had answered; "you have had your fun out of me, now give me
something for my poor people." They gave her five francs, and she
said, "At that price you may tease me as much as you please."

Evelyn asked if it were not extraordinary how an ignorant and uncouth
woman, a goatherd during her childhood, a priest's servant till she
was well on in middle age, should have been able to invent a system
of charity which had penetrated all over Europe. Every moment Evelyn
expected the Prioress to check her, for she was conscious that she
was placing the active orders above the contemplative, Jeanne above
St. Teresa, and, determined to see how far she could go in this
direction without being reproved, she began to speak of how Jeanne,
after having made the beds and cleaned the garret in the morning,
took down a big basket and stood receiving patiently the
remonstrances addressed to her, the blind woman saying, "I am
certain and sure you will forget to ask for the halfpenny a week
which I used to get from the grocery store, you very nearly forgot it
last week, and had to go back for it." "But I'll not make a mistake
this time," Jeanne would answer. Her bed-ridden friend would reprove
her, "But you did forget to ask for my soup." To bear patiently with
all such unjust remonstrances was part of Jeanne'