There was no
harm, for all that'--his eyes twinked merrily--'in tying this
upon the place where you suffered so grievously.'
From amid Basil's long hair he detached what looked like a tiny
skein of hemp, which, with an air singularly blended of shrewdness
and reverence, he declared to be a portion of a garb of penitence
worn by the Holy Martin, to whom the oratory here was dedicated.
Presently Basil found strength to ask whether the abbot had been
beside him.
'Many times,' was the answer. 'The last, no longer ago than
yestereve, ere he went to compline. You would have seen him on the
day of your arrival, ere yet you became distraught, but that a
heaviness lay upon him because of the loss of a precious manuscript
on its way hither from Rome--a manuscript which had been procured
for him after much searching, only to be lost by the folly of one to
whom it was intrusted; if, indeed, it was not rather whisked away by
the Evil One, who, powerless for graver ill against our holy father,
at times seeks to discomfort him by small practice of spite. Sorrow
for this loss brought on a distemper to which his age is subject.
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