"You surprise me," the elder woman cried passionately, flinging away the hand that she had been holding. "You surprise me. I came to you for sympathy, sure that I should find it, believing that you cared for my son almost as much as I care for him. You were his chosen friend--he devoted half his days to you. The closeness of your friendship made malicious people say shameful things, and has given me many an unhappy hour; and now, at this crisis of his life, when he is bent upon burying himself alive in a monastery--entering some severe order, for whose rule of hardship and deprivation he is utterly unfit, a kind of life that will break his heart and bring him to an early grave--you preach to me of his finding peace in those dreary walls--peace--as if he were the worst of sinners." "No, no, you don't understand me. Father Hammond has told me about the monastic life--the Benedictines, La Trappe. He has told me what happiness has been found in that life of solitude and prayer by those who have renounced the world." "Was it you who inspired this extraordinary resolve?" "_I?_ No, indeed. I knew nothing of it till you told me." "What? He could take such a step without consulting you, without confiding in you--his closest friend?" "Was it likely that he would tell me, if he did not tell his mother?" "He told me nothing till he had come here; to make a retreat in a monastery; to give himself time for meditation and thought, before he took any decisive step. He is here in Rome, and has been here for some time. My first knowledge of his decision was a letter he sent me from here. Such an unsatisfactory letter, giving no adequate reason for his resolve, only vague words about his weariness of life and the world." "What else could he say? That must always be the reason. One gets tired of everything--and then one turns to God--and a life of prayer seems best. It is death in life; but it may mean peace." "Vera, I was never more shocked and disappointed. I thought you loved him when love was sin. I thought you loved him at the peril of your soul; and now, when a terrible calamity has left you free to do what you like with the rest of your life, now, when however deeply you may mourn for your husband's awful death, and grieve over any sins of omission in your married life, yet there must needs be the far-off thought of years to come, when without self-reproach, you may give yourself to a lover who in years and temperament would be your natural companion----" "There has been no such thought in my mind," Vera said coldly. "I shall never cease to mourn for Mario Provana's death. I have nothing else in the world to live for." "My poor girl. It is only natural that you should feel like that. I did wrong to speak of the future. You have passed through a horrible ordeal, and it may be long before you can forget. But you are too kind not to be sorry for a mother who is threatened with the loss of all that she has of joy and comfort in this world."