The Hill of Venus

A gleam passed over the latter's face. At last he had to put the question. All hung upon that moment, all; – his eternal happiness and damnation. Should he reveal his request at once, with nothing to allay its harshness?

A sudden rush of pain decided the matter.

"You ask me what you should do?" he replied slowly. "There is but one thing to do, – there is but one choice. It is for you to live the life in which I have failed. Take the vows. Become a monk, content to live apart from men, alone with tomes and prayers and God, – removed from the temptation which caused my fall!"

The sick man drew a short and painful breath, scarcely lower in sound than three words spoken close by his side, spoken as with the voice of a phantom.

"Become a monk!" —

The elder Villani did not stir. He reclined in the cushions, his eyes fixed upon his son with a pitiful look of pleading, which might do far more than words, to prepare the youth's mind for such a thought.

Slowly, almost unconsciously, Francesco moved away from the bed. His gaze wandered aimlessly about the room. His ideas refused to concentrate themselves upon anything. It was too monstrous to conceive! It was past belief, past understanding, – an ill-timed jest perhaps – but yet a jest!

And he burst out with a laugh in which there was no thought of mirth.

"A monk!"

The old man regarded him anxiously.

"I did not jest!"

The laugh died to silence, then rose again in his throat, but Francesco's eyes were terrible.

"Am I fitted for a monk?" he spoke at last. "You know what my life has been. Have not you placed me in the sphere of the court, even ere I had attained the power to think? How can I become a monk? What do I know of the way of monks? What do I know of their lives? I must have time to think!"

"There is no time," insisted the elder Villani, despair in his eyes.

"There is no time!" Francesco exclaimed aghast.

Then all the blood rushed to his heart.

"You mean that I am to decide, here and now?"

"Here and now!" came the low, inexorable voice.

The youth sprang from his seat.

"Then I say no, – no, – no!" he shouted, his eyes flashing fierce determination from the pale face. "I am not fit to be a monk! I will not be a monk! I am of the living, – I came for the sunlight, not the shadow of the cloister! Never – never – never!"

A terrible, indefinable expression passed into the eyes of the sick man. It passed out again, but the trace remained.

When he spoke again, his voice was weak, and there was a note in it of despair.

"Deem you, that I have not thought of it, that I have not weighed in the balance all your objections to the life of the cloister when I asked this thing of you? You say you are of the court! You came for the sunlight, not the shadow! What man does not! But you forget, there is a force that shapes our ends, – you forget – your origin, – your birth! I am your father and my sin is yours! We are both impure in the sight of God! I have opened a means of salvation for both of us – the Way of the Cross. A glorious way it is, for by it my soul shall belong to you! In the sight of men you are as nothing! The blot of your birth can never be effaced! But you are my son! Therefore, here on my death-bed I command you to leave this world, that you may open the way to another, – a better one, – to both of us, – to both of us, Francesco, – to you and to me!"

There was a long silence between them, a silence of dread and expectation for the one, – of fear and despair for the other.

At last Francesco raised his head.

"And she, whom I never knew, – she who was my mother," he asked bitterly – "have you saved her soul? Or is that too left for me to do?"

"If prayers and penances avail, and masses untold, – her soul is in Heaven! Yet – how do I know if the sacrifice availed?"

Francesco again relapsed into silence.

Out of the mist before his eyes there rose his own life. He saw its shimmering past, – all the allurement for happiness it held out, – and the dreary future decreed for him, to atone for another's sin.

"What is required to make a monk of me?" he queried with a dead voice. "What cloister am I to enter?"

The sick man breathed quickly.

"All these matters have I arranged. From His Holiness himself have I letters, sanctioning the matter. You will be given the right of friar's orders that shall free you at times from the weariness and monotony of the cloister. In all difficulties or troubles you will appeal directly to the Pontiff! These privileges are great!"

"The Pontiff!" Francesco uttered with a start. "Pope Clement IV is the mortal enemy of those to whom I have pledged my troth, to whom I owe allegiance. I am a Ghibelline!" he concluded, as if struck by a new thought. "I can never become a monk!"

For a moment the elder Villani lay silent, as if dazed by this sudden unforeseen resistance. He forced himself to answer calmly and not to betray his own misgivings.

"Your reasons are mere sophistry!" he said, after a brief pause. "Has the party of Conradino the power to pave your way to Heaven, – to save my soul from perdition? To insure your mother's eternal peace? Your path lies henceforth with the Church, from which only my own perverseness and blindness had severed you. For you henceforth there are no commands save those of the Holy Father! What are Guelphs and Ghibellines to you in this of all homes, – when I am lying at the door of death?"

"They will look upon me as an ingrate, a renegade, a traitor, – and she of all, – she – "

He covered his face with his hands.

"What say you?" asked his father drearily.

"Where am I to go?" came the monotonous response.

"You will repair to Monte Cassino, there to serve your novitiate. Your time is to be shortened by special dispensation. At the end of that period you will be called to Rome, to enter the Chapter House of the Order of St. John. It holds out greater honor and privileges than any in the world. You will take your orders directly from His Holiness. The path to glory and to holiness lies open to you. Are you satisfied?"

A moan came from Francesco's lips.

"My strength is failing, – your word, – to God!"

Francesco stood beside his father's death-bed, his arms hanging limply by his side. His damp hair clung closely to his head. His eyes were dull and unseeing.

Like a breath of the evening wind his youth had passed from him. His gaze was not upon his father's face, but turned inwardly upon the great aching void where his happiness had been.

When he spoke his words were low, his tone and his face alike without expression.

"In the sight of God, I promise to become a monk!"

The old man, straining to catch the words, drank them into his soul.

His face relaxed. A sigh passed his lips. His failing strength had apparently returned to him.

"You may call Fra Anselmo," he said gently. "But first, my son, kneel to receive my blessing!"

Francesco stumbled blindly to the bedside and forced himself to kneel. He shivered, as the sick man's hot, dry hand lay upon his hair, and only by main force he restrained himself from crying out aloud.