gain at the commissioner.

"Well?" said Ralph.

"The papistical ways," she said.

Ralph felt a sudden distrust of the woman; but he hardened his heart. He
set a mark opposite her name; she had been professed ten years, he saw
by the list.

"Very well," he said; "I will tell my Lady Abbess." She still hesitated
a moment.

"There will be a provision for me?" she asked

"There will be a provision," said Ralph a little grimly. He was
authorised to offer in such cases a secular dress and a sum of five
shillings.

Lastly came in Margaret herself.

Ralph hardly knew her. He had been unable to distinguish her at mass,
and even now as she faced him in her black habit and white head-dress it
was hard to be certain of her identity. But memory and sight were
gradually reconciled; he remembered her delicate eyebrows and thin
straight lips; and when she spoke he knew her voice.

They talked a minute or two about their home; but Ralph did not dare to
say too much, considering what he had yet to say.

"I must ask you the questions," he said at last, smiling at her.

She looked up at him nervously, and dropped her eyes once more.

She nodded or shook her head in silence at each enquiry, until at last
one bearing upon the morals of the house came up; then she looked
swiftly up once more, and Ralph saw that her grey eyes were terrified.

"You must tell me," he said; and put the question again.

"I do not know what you mean," she answered, staring at him bewildered.

Ralph went on immediately to the next.

At last he reached the crisis.

"Margaret," he said, "I have something to tell you." He stopped and
began to play with his pen. He had seldom felt so embarrassed as now in
the presence of this shy sister of his of whom he knew so little. He
could not look at her.

"Margaret, you know, you--you are under age. The King's Grace has
ordered that all under twenty years of age are to leave their convents."

There was a dead silence.

Ralph was enraged with his own weakness. He had begun the morning's work
with such determination; but the strange sweet atmosphere of the house,
the file of women coming in one by one with their air of innocence and
defencelessness had affected him. In spite of himself his religious side
had asserted itself, and he found himself almost tremulous now.

He made a great effort at self-repression, and looked up with hard
bright eyes at his sister.

"There must be no crying or rebellion," he