“well,” brock inquired, three days later; “have you been doing ecclesiastics again, to-day?”
nancy, glancing up from her soup, registered the impression that brock supported an extremely good tailor, and that his sabbath raiment was becoming to him.
“yes. you told me that this was the proper day for it.”
“where did you go?”
“to the basilica, of course.”
brock smiled.
“true to the tradition of the tourist. by the way, that’s rather a good alliteration. i think i’ll use it again sometime.”
nancy disregarded his rhetorical outburst and pinned her attention to the fact.
“do they always go there?”
“yes, to start with. of course, you didn’t stop there.”
“but i did. why not?”
“miss howard, you have neglected your opportunities. the regular tourist itinerary begins with the basilica at ten, sneaks out and goes over to the english cathedral at eleven and follows on the tail of the band when it escorts the soldiers home to the citadel. then it takes in the ursuline chapel at two, stops to drop a tear over montcalm’s skull and then skurries off, on the chance of getting in an extra service before five-o’clock benedictions at the franciscan convent.”
“the white chapel with the pale green pillars?”
“yes, out on the grand allée.”
“i’ve been there,” she assented. “i love the place.”
“and then,” brock continued inexorably; “if you make good time over your supper, you can just get back to the basilica at seven.”
nancy drew a long breath.
“but i don’t need to do all that,” she objected. “there are more sundays coming.”
“that makes no difference. every stranger is bound to gallop through his first sunday in quebec. it is one of the duties of the place. you think you won’t do it; but, at two o’clock, you’ll have an uneasy consciousness that those cloistered nuns over at the ursuline may do something or other worth seeing. by quarter past two, you’ll be buried in a haze of medi?valism and incense.”
“never!” she protested, with what proved to be strict adherence to truth.
“and what about the basilica?” brock asked her.
“superb!” nancy’s eyes lighted. “i was there, a few days ago. it was empty, and it didn’t impress me in the least. it seemed to me a dead weight of white enamel paint and gold leaf, so heavy that it wasn’t even cheerful. but to-day—”
“to-day?” he echoed interrogatively.
but nancy made an unexpected digression.
“mr. brock, what is that huge pinky-purple tam o’shanter dangling above the chancel?”
“miss howard, where was your bump of reverence, and where were your guide-books?”
“my bump of reverence was fastened down with hatpins, and my guide-books are buried in the bottom of my trunk.”
“since when?”
“since i made the discovery that quebec must be inhaled, not analyzed,” she responded promptly.
brock laid down his knife and fork, and patted his hands together in mock applause.
“a subtle distinction. might i ask whether it applies to the incense?”
nancy made a wry face.
“no. incense should be a symbol, not a fact. it is destructive to all my devotional spirit. still, even in this one week, i have become an epicure in it. granted that the wind is in the right direction, i can recognize the brand at least a block away. i like the kind they use at the basilica best. that out at the franciscan convent is doubtless choice; but it is a bit too pungent for my protestant nose.” then of a sudden her face grew grave. “please don’t think i am making fun of serious matters, mr. brock,” she added. “even if i do dislike the incense, i can appreciate the beauty of the service, and i should be ashamed of myself, if i couldn’t be really and truly reverent in the midst of all that dignified worship.”
brock was no catholic; he possessed the average devoutness of his age and epoch. nevertheless, he liked nancy’s swift change of mood. all in all, he liked nancy extremely, and he was sincerely grateful to the fate which had given him this attractive table companion. the past three days had brought them into an excellent understanding and friendship. trained in totally different lines, they yet had many a point in common. they were equally direct, equally frank, equally blest with the saving sense of humor. in spite of the dainty femininity of all her belongings, nancy met brock with the unconscious simplicity of a growing boy. the manner was new to brock, and he found it altogether pleasing. most of the women he had met, had contrived to impress upon him that he was expected to flirt with them. it was obvious that nancy howard wished either to be liked for herself, or to be let alone.
“then you enjoyed yourself?” he asked.
nancy’s mind went swiftly backward over the morning. impressionable and artistic of temperament, she could yet feel the thrill which accompanies the worship of close-packed, kneeling humanity, still hear the chanting of the huge antiphonal choirs, the throng of priests in the chancel answered by the green-sashed seminarians in the organ loft above. the gorgeous robes of the celebrants, the ascetic face of the young preacher, and even the motley crowd who, too poor to hire seats in a church of such wealth and fashion, knelt in a huddled mass of humanity upon the bare pavement just within the nave: all these were details; but they helped to fill in a picture of absolute devotion and faith. nancy raised her eyes to brock’s face.
“i would be willing to pray with a rosary, all my days,” she said impulsively; “if it would give me the look of some of those people.”
for a moment, brock felt, the look was hers. then she laughed again.
“still, i shall always have one regret. why didn’t you tell me how to make a procession of myself?”
“what do you mean?”
“about the gorgeous man that ushers one in?”
“i didn’t know there was one.”
“mr. brock!”
“miss howard?”
“but you ought to.”
“but i don’t go to the basilica.”
“not always, of course; but surely sometimes.”
“i was never inside the doors.”
“i met,” nancy observed reflectively; “a new york man, last summer, who had never set eyes on the washington arch.”
“well?”
“well, the two cases seem to me to be about parallel.”
brock reddened. nevertheless, it was impossible to take offence at nancy’s downright tone and, the color still in his cheeks, he laughed.
“i may as well plead guilty. but who is the man?”
“the new yorker?”
“no; the basilica.”
“what is he, you’d better say. he appears to be a mixture of an usher, a tithingman and a glorious personification of the church militant. he is at least six feet tall, and he wears a long blue coat with scarlet facings and yards of gold lace. that would be impressive enough; but he gains an added bit of dignity by perambulating himself up the aisles with a tall, gold-headed sceptre in his hand.”
“did he also perambulate you?”
nancy’s head moved to and fro in sorrowful negation.
“no; nobody told me about him, and i lost my chance. i was so disappointed, too. one doesn’t get a chance, every day in the week, to be converted into a whole triumphal procession with an ecclesiastical drum-major at its head.”
“most likely it is only a sunday luxury there,” brock suggested dryly. “but what did you do?”
nancy’s face lengthened.
“i disgraced myself,” she confessed. “but how could i know the customs of the country? i went in good season, and i stood back, meekly waiting for an usher, until the whole open space around me was full of men, kneeling on handkerchiefs and newspapers and even on their soft hats. i began to feel like a tower of babel set out in the middle of a village of huts. i know i never was half so tall before. and still no usher came. at last, i couldn’t bear it any longer, and i sneaked into an empty pew, half-way up the aisle.”
brock nodded.
“oh; but it wasn’t at all the right thing to do. i was barely seated, when i felt a forefinger poke itself into my shoulder. i looked around, and there stood a woman in crape, frowning at me as if i were a naughty child. she whispered something to me. it sounded very stern; but i couldn’t understand what it was about, so i just smiled at her and started to move in. but she poked me again, quite viciously, that time, and pointed out into the aisle. then i understood her.”
“and obeyed?” brock asked, laughing.
“what else could i do? she was taller than i.”
“and then?”
“then the good samaritan appeared.”
“the gold-laced one?”
“no; nothing so impressive. he was a little frenchman who came out of his pew farther down the aisle, and in the nicest possible english asked me to go there with him. you’ve no idea how merciful he was to me, nor how i appreciated it. i was beginning to feel like an outcast, and he saved my self-respect and returned it to me, unbroken.”
brock started to answer; but dr. howard had appealed to nancy for confirmation of one of his statements. by dint of much effort and at cost of frequent misunderstandings, the good doctor had established relations with his neighbor across the table, and the two men had been toiling through a prolonged conversation. concerning mere matters of theory, each fondly imagined that he understood the other perfectly. confronted with the problem of the ultimate destination of the sugar-bowl, they lost their bearings completely, and were forced to supplement their tongues with the use of their right forefingers.
nancy’s acquaintance with the row of frenchmen was limited to the careful distribution, at every meal, of exactly two little nods apiece, one of hail, the other of farewell. since her first meeting with brock, she had been surprised at the chance which had continually brought them into the dining-room at the same hour; and, in her absorption in his talk, one or other of the frenchmen was often half through his deliberate meal before she remembered to deal out to him his nod of greeting. she liked them well enough; but, at the present stage of intercourse, they seemed to her a good deal like well-bred automatons.
while nancy talked to her father, brock eyed her furtively. she wore a dark green gown, that noon, and her vivid hair was piled high in an intricate heap of burnished coils. her hands were bare of rings, her whole costume void of the dangling ornaments which brock so keenly detested; but, close in the hollow of her throat, there blazed one great opal like a drop of liquid fire.
so suddenly that he had no time to drop his eyes to his plate, nancy turned to him.
“mr. brock, there is my french samaritan!” she exclaimed softly.
brock glanced up at the figure who was moving past the table where they sat.
“that? that is st. jacques,” he said.
“who is he?”
“a law student, over at laval, and one of the best fellows walking the earth at the present time,” brock answered, with the swift enthusiasm which, as nancy discovered in the weeks to come, was one of his most striking characteristics.
nancy rested her elbows on the table, with a fine disregard of appearances.
“well, he looks it,” she said impressively.
“he’s all right.” brock nodded over his grapes.
“and lives here?”
“eats here; that’s all. the table just back of you is full of laval men. they come in relays, twenty of them for the six seats; and johnny bull sits enthroned among them like a mute at the funeral feast. st. jacques sits just back of your father. i wonder you haven’t noticed him before.”
nancy played aimlessly with her grapes for a minute or two. then, turning slightly in her chair, she looked over her shoulder towards the next table. as she did so, the man who sat exactly at her back, moved by some sudden impulse, turned at the same instant, and nancy found herself staring directly into the unrecognizing eyeglasses of no less a person than mr. cecil barth.
