ather La Combe arrive
from Verceil. He told me that I must return to Paris without any delay.
It was in the evening, and he said, "set off the next morning." I
confess this sudden news startled me. It was for me a double sacrifice
to return to a place where they had cried me down so much; also toward
a family which held me in contempt, and who had represented my journey,
caused by pure necessity, as a voluntary course, pursued through human
attachments. Behold me then disposed to go off, without offering a
single word in reply, with my daughter and my maid, without anybody to
guide and attend us. Father La Combe was resolved not to accompany me,
not so much as passing the mountains. The Bishop of Geneva had written
on all sides that I was gone to Turin to run after him. But the Father
Provincial, who was a man of quality, and well acquainted with the
virtue of Father La Combe, told him, that it was improper and unsafe to
venture on these mountains, without some person of acquaintance; the
more as I had my little daughter with me. He therefore ordered him to
accompany me. Father La Combe confessed to me that he had some
reluctance to do it, and only obedience, and the danger to which I
should have been exposed, made him surmount it. He was only to
accompany me to Grenoble, and from thence to return to Turin. I went
off then, designing for Paris, there to suffer whatever crosses and
trials it should please God to inflict.

What made me go by Grenoble was the desire I had to spend two or three
days with a lady, an eminent servant of God, and one of my friends.
When I was there Father La Combe and that lady spoke to me not to go
any farther. God would glorify Himself in me and by me in that place.
He returned to Verceil, and I left myself to be conducted as a child by
Providence. This lady took me to the house of a good widow, there not
being accommodations at the inn. As I was ordered to stop at Grenoble,
at her house I resided. I placed my daughter in a convent, and resolved
to employ all this time in resigning myself to be possessed in solitude
by Him who is the absolute Sovereign of my soul. I made not any visit
in this place; no more had I in any of the others where I had
sojourned. I was greatly surprised when, a few days after my arrival,
there came to see me several persons who made profession of a singular
devotion to God. I perceived immediately a gift which He had given me,
of administering to each that which sui