ution from me."

"Impose your penance," I cried eagerly. "There is none I will not
undertake, to purchase pardon and some little peace of mind.

"I will consider it," he answered gravely. "And now let us seek your
mother. She must be told, for a great deals hangs upon this, Agostino.
The career to which you were destined is no longer for you, my son."

My spirit quailed under those last words; and yet I felt an immense
relief at the same time, as if some overwhelming burden had been lifted
from me.

"I am indeed unworthy," I said.

"It is not your unworthiness that I am considering, my son, but your
nature. The world calls you over-strongly. It is not for nothing that
you are the child of Giovanni d'Anguissola. His blood runs thick in your
veins, and it is very human blood. For such as you there is no hope
in the cloister. Your mother must be made to realize it, and she must
abandon her dreams concerning you. It will wound her very sorely. But
better that than..." He shrugged and rose. "Come, Agostino."

And I rose, too, immensely comforted and soothed already, for all that
I was yet very far from ease or peace of mind. Outside his room he set a
hand upon my arm.

"Wait," he said, "we have ministered in some degree to your poor spirit.
Let us take thought for the body, too. You need garments and other
things. Come with me."

He led me up to my own little chamber, took fresh raiment for me from
a press, called Lorenza and bade her bring bread and wine, vinegar and
warm water.

In a very weak dilution of the latter he bade me bathe my lacerated
feet, and then he found fine strips of linen in which to bind them ere I
drew fresh hose and shoes. And meanwhile munching my bread and salt and
taking great draughts of the pure if somewhat sour wine, my mental peace
was increased by the refreshment of my body.

At last I stood up more myself than I had been in these last twelve
awful hours--for it was just noon, and into twelve hours had been packed
the events that well might have filled a lifetime.

He put an arm about my shoulder, fondly as a father might have done, and
so led me below again and into my mother's presence.

We found her kneeling before the Crucifix, telling her beads; and we
stood waiting a few moments in silence until with a sigh and a rustle of
her stiff black dress she rose gently and turned to face us.

My heart thudded violently in that moment, as I looked into that pale
face of sorrow. Then