midnight assassins.

"I have never come across anyone like this before," continued the
verger. "I was not in the least prepared for you. What could have
induced you to come in and contemplate all this darkness, and risk being
locked up for the night? If I had been at the other end when I
discovered you, I should have fled, quite sure that you were ghosts. I
tell you that I have seen ghosts, but I do not care to converse with
them; they rather frighten me."

"Those fair penitents," murmured H.C. "They looked very graceful and
picturesque; therefore they ought to be very pretty. Could I go and see
them, and make a sketch of them? Do you think they would admit me? Are
they nuns?"

"They are not nuns, or they would not be here," returned the old verger.
"But they do a great deal of good. For my part I should say their
confession was superfluous. They can have no sins. _I_ never go to
confession. What could I say? My life is always the same. I get up in
the morning, open the church; lock it up at night, go to bed. I eat my
meals in peace, do harm to no one, am in charity with all men. There is
my life from January to December. What have I to confess?"

"You are an extremely interesting character, but not so interesting as
the fair penitents," said H.C., bringing him back to the point from
which he had wandered. "Who are they, and can I go and call upon them?"

"I don't believe they would admit you if you took them an order from the
Pope," returned the old verger emphatically. "Without being nuns, they
have taken a vow of celibacy, and live in partial retirement. No man is
ever admitted within their portals, excepting their Father Confessor,
and he is old and ugly; in fact, the very image of a baboon. A very good
and pious man, all the same, is his reverence, and very learned. These
ladies teach the children of the poor; they nurse the sick; they have a
small orphanage; and they are full of good works."

"Why were they here to-night?"

"Whenever that very holy man, the Reverend Father, visits Quimper, they
always make it a point of going to confess to him the very first night
of his arrival. The good Mother of the establishment, as she is called,
is his cousin. I am told that she is Madame la Comtesse, by right, but
renounced the world for the sake of doing good. The Reverend Father
arrived only this evening by train. He went straight to the palace, took
a bouillon, and immediately came on here. He is a great man. You