But there was a kind hand which warded off a blow which might have been fatal to his blameless son. Don Ferdinand and Louis de Montemar lay in their wounds under the same roof; and by the same gentle ministry they were attended.
The Marchioness and her daughter found no difference in their hearts between the sufferers; for if the one had the claims of a brother and a son upon their tenderness, the other had purchased the life of that dear relative by the exposure of his own; and the bonds of gratitude were not less sacred than those of kindred.
Marcella sought to cheer her brother, by assuring him that her prejudices against a monastic life should no longer stand between him and his happiness, if that compliance with her father's wishes could obtain his consent to Ferdinand's union with the cousin of his friend. But she did not withhold from her brother, the Marquis's remark on the sacrifice she offered to make in his behalf.
"However," continued she, "our aunt, the abbess of the Ursalines, is too charitable to force my conscience to more than the vow and the seclusion; and I trust that Heaven will not see any crime in a Protestant nun, worshipping in spirit and in truth, by the side of sisters from whom the cloud of error has not yet been raised!"
Ferdinand gazed upon his sister while she spoke. Was the fabled Iphigenia of Tauris half so fair, or the virgin daughter of Jephthah so full of youthful loveliness, as she who now talked, with such sweet smiles, of immolating herself for him? She was indeed the victim, clad in the lilly and the rose; and the fragrance of the flowers, and the morning dew of their leaves, breathed and sparkled from her lips, as she pursued her disinterested theme. Bodily suffering, and hours of solitary reflection, had opened to Ferdinand a clear view of his former injustice in seeking happiness at the expence of his sister's liberty; and, abhorring such utter selfishness, he was ashamed to acknowledge its late power over him, even by disavowing its continuance; and with a deep blush, and deeper sigh, he pressed her hand without a word.
But in Marcella's separated heart, the vow of abjuration from the world was already registered. She had now but one duty;--to wait with her lamp trimmed, while she ministered to all who needed her deeds of charity; and, as a _Sister of Mercy_, whose garb she wore, she daily attended her mother to the couch of the preserver of her brother.