Father Denfili, old and blind, telling his beads in the corner of the
cloister garden, sighed. Father Tomasso, who had brought him from his
confessional in the great church to the bench where day after day he
kept his sightless vigil over the pond of the goldfish, turned back at
the sound, then, seeing the peace of Father Denfili's face, thought he
must have fancied the sigh. For sadness came alien to the little
garden of the Community of San Ambrogio on Via Paoli, a lustrous gem
of a little garden under its square of Roman sky. The dripping of the
tiny fountain, tinkling like a bit of familiar music, and the swelling
tones of the organ, drifting over the flowers that clustered beneath
the statue of Our Lady of Lourdes, so merged their murmurings into the
peacefulness of San Ambrogio, that Father Tomasso, just from the
novitiate, felt intensely that he knew he must have dreamed Father
Denfili's sigh. For what could trouble the old man here in San
Ambrogio on this, the greatest day of the Community?
For to-day Father Ramoni had returned to Rome. Even as Father Tomasso
passed the fountain a group of Fathers and novices were gathering
around one of the younger priests, who still wore his fereoula and
wide-brimmed hat, just as he had entered from Via Paoli. The
newcomer's eyes traveled joyously over his breathless audience,
calling Father Tomasso to join in hearing his news.
"Yes, it is true," he was saying. "I have just come from the audience.
Father General and Father Ramoni stopped to call at the Secretariate
of State, but I came straight home to tell you. His Holiness was most
kind, and Father Ramoni was not a mite abashed, even in the presence
of the Pope. When he knelt down the Holy Father raised him up and gave
him a seat. 'Tell me all about your wonderful people and your
wonderful work,' he said. And Father Ramoni told him of the thousands
he had converted and how easy it was, with the blessing of God, to do
so much. The Holy Father asked him every manner of question. He was
full of enthusiasm for the great things our Father Ramoni has done. He
is the greatest man in Rome to-day, is Ramoni. He will be honored by
the Holy See. The Pope showed it plainly. This is a red-letter day for
our Community." The little priest paused for breath, then hastened on.
"Rome knows that our Father Ramoni has come back," he cried, "and Rome
has not forgotten ten years ago."
"Was it ten years that Father Ramoni passed in South America?" a tall
novice asked Father Tomasso.
"Ten years," said Father Tomasso. "He was the great preacher of Rome
when the old General"--he nodded toward the cloister corner where
Father Denfili prayed--"sent him away from Rome. No one knew why. His
fame was at its height. Men and women of all the city crowded the
church to listen to him, and he was but thirty-four years old. But
Father Denfili sent him away to Marqua, commanding the Superior of our
Order out there to send him to those far-off mountain people of whom
the papers were telling at that time. I did not know Father Romani
well. I was a novice at the time. But I knew that he did not want to
go from Rome; though, being a good religious, he obeyed. Now, see what
has happened. He has converted over one-third of that people, and the
rest are only waiting for missionaries."
"And the work is all Father Ramoni's?" the novice asked.
"All." Father Tomasso drew him a little farther from the group that
still listened to the little priest who had come from the Vatican.
"Father Ramoni found that the people had many Christian traditions and
were almost white; but it was he who instilled the Faith in their
hearts. There must be thirty of our Fathers in Marqua now," he
continued proudly, "and sooner or later, all novices will have to go
out there. Father Ramoni has made a splendid Prefect-Apostolic. No
wonder they have summoned him to Rome for consultation. I have
heard"--he lowered his voice as he glanced over his shoulder to where
Father Denfili sat on the bench by the pond--"that it is certain that
Marqua is to be made a Province, with an archbishop and two bishops.
There is a seminary in Marqua, even now, and they are training some of
the natives to be catechists. I tell you, Brother Luigi, missionary
history has never chronicled such wonders as our Father Ramoni has
wrought."
From behind them came the rising voice of the little priest, bubbling
into laughter. "And as I came through the Pincio all that I heard was
his name. I had to wait for a duchessa's carriage to pass. She was
telling an American woman of the times when Father Ramoni had preached
at San Carlo. 'His words would convert a Hindu,' she was saying. And
the Marchesi di San Quevo leaned from his horse to tell me that he had
heard that Father Ramoni will be one of the Cardinals of the next
Consistory. Is it not wonderful?"
The murmur of their responses went across the garden to old Father
Denfili. Father Tomasso, crossing the path with the novice, suddenly
saw a strange look of pain on the old priest's face, and started
toward him just as the gate to the cloister garden swung back,
revealing a picture that held him waiting. Four men--a great Roman
prelate, the General of San Ambrogio, Father Ramoni and Father Pietro,
Ramoni's secretary--were coming into the garden. Of the four Father
Ramoni stood out in the center of the group as vividly as if a
searchlight were playing on his magnificent bigness. His deep black
eyes, set in a face whose strength had been emphasized by its exposure
to sun and wind, gleamed joyous with his mood. His mouth, large,
expressive, the plastic mouth of the orator, was curving into a smile
as he gave heed to the speech of the prelate beside him. Once he shook
his head as the great man, oblivious of their coming before a crowd of
intent watchers, continued the words he had been saying on Via Paoli.
"And the Holy See is about to make your Marqua into a Province. Is it
not wonderful, Father Ramoni, that you will go back with that gift to
the people you converted? And yet to me it is more wonderful that you
wish to go back. Why do you not stay here? You, a Roman, would
advance."
"Not now, Monsignore," the missionary answered quickly. They were
passing the group near the fountain, going toward the bench where
Father Denfili sat. Ramoni's secretary, a thin, serious-visaged priest
of about the same age as his Superior, with bald head and timid,
shrinking eyes, took with the greatest deference the cloak and hat
Father Ramoni handed to him. Then he fell back of the old General.
The prelate answered Ramoni. "But you are right, of course," he
admitted. "It is best that you return. The Church needs you there now.
But later on--_chi lo sa_? You are to preach Sunday afternoon at San
Carlo? I shall be there to hear you. So will all Rome, I suppose. Ah,
you do well here! '_Filius urbis et orbis_--son of the city and the
world.' It's a great title, Ramoni!"
They had come in front of the bench where Father Denfili told his
beads. The prelate turned to the old General of San Ambrogio with
deference. "Is it not so, Father?" he asked. But Father Denfili raised
his sightless eyes as if he sought to focus them upon the group before
him. Father Ramoni, laughingly dissenting, suddenly felt his joy
congealing into a cold fear that bound his heart. He turned away
angrily, then recovered himself in time. Father Denfili was no longer
on the bench beside the pond. He was groping his way back to the
chapel.
It was a month before the Consistory met to nominate the new hierarchy
for Marqua. It had been expected that the first meeting would end in
decisive action and that, immediately afterward, the great missionary
of the Community of San Ambrogio would return with increased authority
and dignity to his charge. But something--one of those mysterious
"somethings" peculiar to Rome--had happened, and the nominations were
postponed.
In the month that Father Ramoni remained in Rome he had tasted the
fruits of his old popular success. On his first Sunday at home he
preached in San Carlo as well as ever--better than ever. And the awed
crowd he looked down on at the end of his sermon took away from the
church the tidings of his greater power. From that time nearly every
moment was taken by the demands of people of position and authority,
who wished to make the most of him before he went back to Marqua. He
scarcely saw his brethren at all, except after his Mass, when he went
to the refectory for his morning coffee. He had no time to loiter in
the garden, and the story of the conversion of the people of Marqua
was left to the quiet Fr. Pietro, who told the splendid tales of his
Superior's great work, till Father Tomasso and Brother Luigi prayed to
be given the opportunity to be Ramoni's servants in the far-away land
of the western world. But, if Ramoni was but seldom in the cloister,
he did not avoid Father Denfili. The old blind priest seemed to meet
him everywhere, in the afternoons on the Pincio, in the churches where
he preached, in the subdued crowds at ecclesiastical assemblies. Once
Ramoni caught a glimpse of his face lifted toward him during a
conference; and a remembrance of that old look in the cloister garden
gave him the sensation of belief that the old General could see, even
though Ramoni himself, was the only one whom he saw.
On the day the letter from the Vatican came, Father Ramoni, detained
in the cloister by the expected visit of a prelate who had expressed
his desire to meet the missionary of Marqua, passed Father Denfili on
his way to the reception-room. While Father Ramoni, summoning his
secretary to bring some photographs for better explanation of the
South American missions, went on his way, the blind man groped along
the wall till he reached the General's office. He had come to the door
when he felt that undercurrent of anxiety which showed itself on the
white faces of the General and his assistant, who stood gazing mutely
at the letter the former held. He heard the General call Father
Tomasso. "Take this to Father Pietro, my son," he said. Then he
listened to the younger priest's retreating footsteps.
Father Tomasso, frightened by the unwonted strangeness of the
General's tone, carried the atmosphere of tense and troubled
excitement with him when he entered the room the prelate was just
leaving. Father Pietro glanced up at him from the table where he was
returning to their case the photographs of Marqua. Tomasso laid the
letter before him and left the room just as Father Ramoni, bidding his
visitor a gay good-bye, turned back.
[Illustration: "I can't take it," he was sobbing, "it's a mistake, a
terrible mistake."]
Father Pietro was taking the letter from its large square envelope. He
read it with puzzled wonder rising to his eyes. Before he came to its
end he was on his feet.
"No! No!" he cried. "It is impossible. It is a mistake."
Father Ramoni turned quickly. The man who had been his faithful
servant for ten years in Marqua was very dear to him. "What is a
mistake, Pietro?" he asked, coming to the table.
"The Consistory," Father Pietro stammered, "the Consistory has made a
mistake. They have done an impossible thing. They have mixed our
names. This letter to the General--this letter--" he pointed to the
document on the table "--says that I have been made Archbishop of
Marqua."
Ramoni took the letter. As he read it he knew what Pietro had not
known. The news was genuine. The name signed at the letter's end
guaranteed that. Ramoni caught the edge of the table. The pain of the
blow gripped him relentlessly and he knew that it was a pain that
would stay. He had been passed over, ignored, set down for Pietro, who
sat weeping beside the table, his head buried in his hands.
"I can't take it," he was sobbing; "I am not able. It's a mistake, a
terrible mistake."
Ramoni put his hand on the other man's head. "It is true, Pietro," he
said. "You are Archbishop of Marqua. May God bless you!"
But he could say no more. Pietro was still weeping when Ramoni went
away, crossing the cloister on his way to his cell, where, with the
door closed behind him, he fought the battle of his soul.