"Except yourself, sweet mother. You never sinned," said Salome, taking the thin, pale hand of the lady and pressing it to her lips. "_Mea culpa!_ I sin every hour of my life!" cried the abbess, crossing herself. "We all do; but you did not sin _there_," said the girl. "I had no part--no active part, I mean--in that tale of guilt and woe. I was a pupil here in this convent then, waiting to be brought out and married to my betrothed. No, I had no part in that tragedy." "Except the passive part of suffering." "Ay, except the passive part of suffering; but hark, my child! the vesper bell is ringing; it calls us to our evening worship: let us go to the choir, and there forget all our earthly cares and seek the peace of Heaven," said the pale lady, slowly rising from her seat. "When will you tell me the story, good mother?" pleaded Salome, in a low and deprecating tone. "The vesper bell is ringing. The rules of the house must not be disturbed by your individual necessities. After the evening service comes the evening meal. Then, for me, my hour of rest in my cell; and for you, the duty of seeing your infant charge put to bed. When all these matters have been properly attended to, come to me in my cell. You will find me there. We shall be uninterrupted until the midnight mass; and in the interim I will tell you the story of a life that 'was lost, but is found, was dead, but is alive'--_Benedicite_, my daughter!" said the abbess, spreading her hands upon the bowed head of the girl, and solemnly blessing her. Then she glided away. Salome soon followed her, and joined the procession of nuns to the chapel. As soon as she took her seat in the choir, she looked through the screen over the congregation below, to see if the strangers were in the chapel; but she saw them not. When the vesper service was over, she took her tea with the nuns in their refectory; and then returned to the play-room in the Infants' Asylum. The nurses were engaged in giving the little ones their supper, and putting them to bed. Salome took up her own little Marie Perdue, to undress her. As she divested the child of her little slip, something rolled out of its bosom and dropped upon the floor. One of the nurses picked it up and handed it to Salome. It was a small, hard substance, wrapped in tissue paper. Salome unrolled it and found a ring, set with a large solitaire diamond. With a cry of surprise and pain, she recognized the jewel. It was her late father's ring! While she gazed upon it in a trance of wonder, the paper in which it had been wrapped, caught by a breeze from the open window, fluttered under her eyes. She saw that there was writing on the paper, and she took it up and read it. "The ring must be sold for the benefit of the child and of the house that has protected her. She must be educated to become a nun." There was no signature to this paper.