r of only two months ago in which
you speak of just such a case as mine. May I quote what you say?

"'Yet even if she were not so (i.e. worthy of your love and
friendship), even if there were, as you say, a fault in her, who
am I that I should judge her harshly? ... I reject the monstrous
theory that while a man may redeem the past a woman never can....
And if she has sinned as I have sinned, and suffered as I have
suffered, I will pray for strength to say, 'Because I love her we
are one, and we stand or fall together.'

"It is so beautiful that I am even happy while my pen copies the
sweet, sweet words, and I feel as I did when the old priest spoke
so tenderly on the day I confessed, telling me I had committed no
sin and had nothing to repent of. Have I never told you about
that? My confessor was a Capuchin, and perhaps I should have
waited for his advice before going farther. He was to consult his
General or his Bishop or some one, and to send for me again.

"But all that is over now, and everything depends upon you. In any
case, be sure of one thing, whatever happens. Bruno has taught me
a great lesson, and there is not anything your enemies can do to
me that will touch me now. They have tried me already with
humiliation, with poverty, with jealousy, and even with the shadow
of shame itself. There is nothing left but death. _And death
itself shall find me faithful to the last._ Good-bye! Your poor
unforgiven girl, ROMA."

The morning after writing this letter Roma received a visit from one of
the Noble Guard. It was the Count de Raymond.

"I am sent by the Holy Father," he said, "to say that he wishes to see
you."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

PART SEVEN--THE POPE

I

On the morning appointed for the visit to the Vatican, Roma dressed in
the black gown and veil prescribed by etiquette for ladies going to an
audience with the Pope.

The young Noble Guard in civilian clothes was waiting for her in the
sitting-room. When she came out of the bedroom he was standing with a
solemn face before the bust of David Rossi, which she had lately cast
afresh and was beginning to point in marble.

"This is wonderful," he said. "Perfectly wonderful! A most astonishing
study."

Roma