Father Hamilton was not without money, though all had been taken from him at Bicêtre. It was an evidence of the width and power of the Jesuit movement that even in the Hôtel Dieu he could command what sums he needed, and Bernard was habituated to come to him for moneys that might pay for himself and the coachman and the horses at the _remise_. On the last of these occasions I took the chance to slip a letter for Miss Walkinshaw into his hand. Instead of putting it in his pocket he laid it down a moment on a table, and he and I were busy packing linen for the wash when a curious cry from Father Hamilton made us turn to see him with the letter in his hand.
He was gazing with astonishment on the direction.
“Ah!” said he, “and so my Achilles is not consoling himself exclusively with the Haemonian lyre, but has taken to that far more dangerous instrument the pen. The pen, my child, is the curse of youth. When we are young we use it for our undoing, and for the facture of regrets for after years--even if it be no more than the reading of our wives' letters that I'm told are a bitter revelation to the married man. And so--and so, Monsieur Croque-mort keeps up a correspondence with the lady. H'm!” He looked so curiously and inquiringly at me that I felt compelled to make an explanation.
“It is quite true, Father Hamilton,” said I. “After all, you gave me so little clerkly work that I was bound to employ my pen somehow, and how better than with my countrywoman?”
“'Tis none of my affair--perhaps,” he said, laying down the letter. “And yet I have a curiosity. Have we here the essential Mercury?” and he indicated Bernard who seemed to me to have a greater confusion than the discovery gave a cause for.
“Bernard has been good enough,” said I. “You discover two Scots, Father Hamilton, in a somewhat sentimental situation. The lady did me the honour to be interested in my little travels, and I did my best to keep her informed.”
He turned away as he had been shot, hiding his face, but I saw from his neck that he had grown as white as parchment.
“What in the world have I done?” thinks I, and concluded that he was angry for my taking the liberty to use the dismissed servant as a go-between. In a moment or two he turned about again, eying me closely, and at last he put his hand upon my shoulder as a schoolmaster might do upon a boy's.