My fears were but half-justified. The occasion surprised him, but not unpleasantly, when Catherine showed virtue, and satisfaction overcame anger in his mind. He accosted my good master fairly civilly and said with mock severity: “Monsieur Coignard, all priests who cultivate the society of courtesans lose thereby their virtue and their good name. And rightly so, even if no pleasure has rewarded their dishonour.” Catherine left the spot with a fine air of offended modesty, and my excellent master answered my father with a sweet and smiling eloquence: “That maxim is excellent, Monsieur Léonard; still one should not apply it without discretion, nor stick it on to everything as the lame cutler labels all his knives ‘sixpence.’ I will not inquire why I merited its application a moment ago. Will it not do if I own that I merited it? “It is not seemly to talk of oneself and it would be too great a shock to my modesty to be obliged to discourse on what is personal to me. I would rather set up the case of the venerable Robert d’Arbrissel who acquired merit from frequenting courtesans. One might also quote St. Abraham, the anchorite of Syria, who did not fear to enter a house of ill-fame.” “What St. Abraham was that?” asked my father, whose thoughts were all put to rout. “Let us sit down outside your door,” said my good master, “bring a jug of wine, and I will tell you the story of this great saint as it was recorded for us by St. Ephraim himself.” My father made a gesture of ready assent. We all three sat down under the eaves, and my good master spoke as follows: “St. Abraham, being already old, lived alone in the desert in a little hut, when his brother died leaving a daughter of great beauty, named Mary. Assured that the life he led would be excellent for his niece, Abraham had built for her a little cell near his own, whence he taught her by means of a small window that he had had pierced. “He took care that she fasted, watched, and sang psalms. But a monk, whom we may suppose to have been a false monk, drew nigh Mary while the holy man Abraham was meditating on the Scriptures, and led the young girl into sin; who thus said to herself: “‘It were far better, since I am dead to God, to go into a country where I am known to none.’ “Leaving her cell she betook herself to a neighbouring town called Edessa, where there were delightful gardens and cool fountains; it is still to this day the pleasantest of the towns of Syria. Meanwhile, the holy man Abraham remained plunged in profound meditation. His niece had already been gone some days when, opening her little window, he asked: “‘Mary, why do you no longer sing the psalms you sang so well?’ And receiving no reply he suspected the truth and cried: ‘A cruel wolf has carried off my ewe lamb from me!’