Don Clemente smiled without answering.
"Well," the Father Abbot continued, "you have wasted an hour of sleep, and now I have my reasons for robbing you of a little more. I intend to speak to you about two matters. You asked my permission to visit a certain Selva and his wife. Have you been there? Yes? Can you assure me that your conscience is at rest?"
Don Clemente answered unhesitatingly, but with a movement of surprise:
"Yes, most certainly."
"Well, well, well," said the Abbot, and took a large pinch of snuff with evident satisfaction. "I do not know these Selvas, but there are people in Rome who do know them, or, at least, think they do. Signor Selva is an author, is he not? Has he not written on religion? I fancy he is a Rosminian, judging by the people who are opposed to him; people unworthy to tie Rosmini's shoe-strings; but let us discriminate! True Rosminians are those at Domodossola, and not those who have wives, eh? Very well then, this evening after supper I received a letter from Rome. They write me—and you must know my correspondent is one of the mighty—that precisely to-night a conventicle was to be held at the house of this false Catholic, Selva, who had summoned to it other malignant insects like himself; that probably you would wish to be present, and that I was to prevent your going. I do not know what I should have done, for when the Holy Father speaks
