"It's terribly on my conscience," went on the other, with distress visibly growing as he spoke. "I feel I ought to have seen which way he was going. He was one of my novices, you know, before we were transferred. . . . He would have been here to-day if all had been well. He was to have been one of my monks. I suggested his name." Monsignor Masterman began to deprecate the self-accusation of the other. "Yes, yes," said the abbot sharply. "But the point is whether anything can be done. The trial begins on Monday, you see." "Will he submit?" The abbot shook his head. "I don't think so. He's extraordinarily determined. But I wanted to know if you could give me any hope on the other side. Could you do anything for him with the Cardinal, or at Rome?" "I . . . I will speak to the Cardinal, certainly, if you wish. But----" "Yes, I know. But you know a great deal depends on the temper of the court. Facts depend for their interpretation upon the point of view." "But I understand that it's definite heresy--that he denies that there is any distinction between the miracles of the Church and----" The abbot interrupted. "Yes, yes, Monsignor. But for all that there's a great deal in the way these things are approached. You see there's so much neutral ground on which the Church has defined nothing." "I am afraid, from what I've seen of the papers, that Dom Adrian will insist on a clear issue." "I'm afraid so: I'm afraid so. We'll do our best here to persuade him to be reasonable. And I thought that if you would perhaps do your best on the other side--would tell the Cardinal, as from yourself, what you think of Dom Adrian." Monsignor nodded. "If we could but postpone the trial for a while," went on the abbot almost distractedly. "That poor boy! His face has been with me all to-day." For an instant Monsignor almost gave way. He felt himself on the point of breaking out into a burst of protest against the whole affair--of denouncing the horror and loathing that during these last days had steadily grown within him--a horror that so far he had succeeded in keeping to himself. Then once more he crushed it down, and stood up for fear his resolution should give way. "I will do what I can, my lord," he said coldly. (III) A great restlessness seized upon the man who had lost his memory that night. He had thought after his return from abroad that things were well with him again--that he had learned the principles of this world that was so strange to him; and his busy days--all that had to be done and recovered, and his success in doing it--these things at once distracted and soothed him. And now once more he was back in his bewilderment.