d departed in a certain aloofness,
leaving her with the fear that she had lost him, also, beyond recall.

Thus she walked in loneliness and sorrow.

As she passed up the steps into the cloisters, she noted that Mary Antony
was not in her accustomed place.

Slightly wondering, and half unconsciously explaining to herself that the
old lay-sister had probably for some reason gone forward with the
Sub-Prioress, the Prioress moved down the now empty passage and entered
her own cell.

On the threshold she paused, astonished.

In front of the shrine of the Madonna, knelt Mary Antony in a kind of
trance, hands clasped, eyes fixed, lips parted, the colour gone from her
cheeks, yet a radiance upon her face, like the after-glow of a vision of
exceeding glory.

She appeared to be wholly unconscious of the presence of the Prioress,
who recovering from her first astonishment, closed the door, and coming
forward laid her hand gently upon the old woman's shoulder.

Mary Antony's eyes remained fixed, but her lips moved incessantly.
Bending over her, the Prioress could make out disjointed sentences.

"Gone! . . . But it was at our Lady's bidding. . . . Flown? Ah, gay
little Knight of the Bloody Vest! Nay, it must have been the archangel
Gabriel, or maybe Saint George, in shining armour. . . . How shall we
live without the Reverend Mother? But the will of our blessed Lady must
be done."

"Antony!" said the Prioress. "Wake up, dear Antony! You are dreaming
again. You are thinking of the robin and the pea. I have not gone from
you; nor am I going. See! I am here."

She turned the old face about, and brought herself into Mary Antony's
field of vision.

Slowly a light of recognition dawned in those fixed eyes; then came a
cry, as of fear and of a great dismay; then a gasping sound, a clutching
of the air. Mary Antony had fallen prone, before the shrine of the
Madonna.

An hour later she lay upon her bed, whither they had carried her. She
had recovered consciousness, and partaken of wine and bread.

The colour had returned to her cheeks, when the Prioress came in,
dismissed the lay-sister in attendance, closed the door, and sat down
beside the couch.

"Thou art better, dear Antony," said the Prioress. "They tell me thy
strength has returned, and this strange fainting is over. Thou must lie
still yet awhile; but will it weary thee to speak?"

"Nay, Reverend Mother, I should dearly love to speak. My soul i