The Everard children returned home early in September to enjoy the preparations for the entrance of Louis into the seminary. The time had arrived for him to take up the special studies of the priesthood, and this meant his separation from the home circle forever. He would come and go for years perhaps, but alas! only as a visitor. The soul of Arthur was knit with the lad's as Jonathan with David. He had never known a youth so gracious and so strange, whose heart was like a sanctuary where
Fair gleams the snowy altar-cloth, The silver vessels sparkle clean, The shrill bell rings, the censer swings, And solemn chants resound between.
But all my heart is drawn above. My knees are bowed in crypt and shrine I never felt the kiss of love, Nor maiden's hand in mine.
"How can you let him go?" he said to Mary Everard, busy with the preparations.
"I am a happy woman that God calls my boy to His service," she answered cheerfully. "The children go anyway ... it's nature. I left father and mother for my own home. How good it is to think he is going to the sanctuary. I know that he is going forever ... he is mine no more ... he will come back often, but he is mine no more. I am heart-broken ... I am keeping a gay face while he is here, for the child must not be worried with our grief ... time enough for that when he is gone ... and he is so happy. My heart is leaving me to go with him. Twenty years since he was born, and in all that time not a moment's pain on his account ... all his life has been ours ... as if he were the father of the family. What shall I be for the rest of my life, listening for his step and his voice, and never a sight or sound of him for months at a time. God give me strength to bear it. If I live to see him on the altar, I shall thank God and die...."
Twenty years she had served him, yet here came the inevitable end, as if such love had never been.
"Oh, you people of faith! I believe you never suffer, nor know what suffering is!"
"Not your kind of suffering, surely, or we would die. Our hope is always with us, and fortunately does not depend on our moods for its power."
Mona teased him into good humor. That was a great moment when in presence of the family the lad put on the dress of the seminary, Arthur's gift. Feeling like a prince who clothes his favorite knight in his new armor, Arthur helped him to don the black cassock, tied the ribbons of the surplice, and fixed the three-cornered cap properly on the brown, curly head. A pallor spread over the mother's face. Mona talked much to keep back her tears, and the father declared it a shame to make a priest of so fine a fellow, since there were too many priests in the world for its good. The boy walked about as proud as a young soldier dressed for his first parade. The Trumps, enraptured at the sight, clapped their hands with joy.