young man's self-reliant spirit, and a further letter had given some
account of "very unsatisfactory proceedings" on Dino's part--of a
refusal to tell where he had been or what he had been doing, and,
finally, of his sudden and unauthorised departure from British shores.
This letter had not tended to put Father Cristoforo into charity with
his late pupil--child of the house, as, in a certain sense, he had been
for many years, and special pet and favourite with the Prior--he was
rather inclined to order Dino back to England without loss of time.
Padre Cristoforo set a high value upon that inheritance in Scotland. He
wished to secure it for Dino--still more for the Church.

He sent back a curt verbal answer. Dino might come to the cloisters on
the following morning after early mass. The Prior would meet him there
as he came from the monastery chapel.

Dino was waiting at the appointed hour. In spite of the displeasure
implied in Padre Cristoforo's message, his heart was swelling with
delight at the sight of the well-known Italian hills, at the sunshine
and the sweet scents that came to him with the crystal clearness of the
Italian atmosphere. He loved the white walls of the monastery, the
vine-clad slopes and olive groves around it, the glimpses of purple sea
which one caught from time to time in the openings left in the
chestnut-woods, where he had wandered so often when he was a boy. These
things were dear to Dino: he had loved them all his life, and it was a
veritable home-coming to him when he presented himself at San Stefano.

And yet the home-coming would not be without its peculiar trials. Never
once had Father Cristoforo been seriously angry with him, and the habit
of obedience, of almost filial reverence, reviving in Dino's heart as he
approached the monastery precincts, made him think with some awe of the
severity which the Prior's face had sometimes shown to impenitent
culprits. Was he impenitent? He did not know. Was he afraid? No, Dino
assured himself, looking up to the purple mountains and the cloudless
sky, with a grave smile of recognition and profound content, he was
afraid of nothing now.

He waited until the service was over. The peal of the organ, the sound
of the monks' chant, reached him where he stood, but he did not enter
the little chapel. A sense of unworthiness came over him. As the short,
sharp stroke of the bell smote upon his ear, he fell upon his knees, and
rested his forehead against the