On that very morning, as I told you, she set her foot upon the Pope's mandate, and would accept no absolving from her vows.

Naught would suffice, said she, but a direct vision and revelation from our Lady herself." "But," said the Knight, slowly, "was there a vision, my lord?
Was there a revelation?
Was there a spoken message or a given sign ?" The Bishop met the earnest eyes, full of a deep searching.

He stirred uneasily; then smiled, waving a deprecatory hand.
"Between ourselves, my dear Hugh--though even so, it is not well to be too explicit--between ourselves of course nothing--well--miraculous happened, beyond the fact that our Lady most certainly sharpened the wits of old Antony.

Therefore is it, that you undoubtedly owe your wife to those same wits, and may praise our Lady for sharpening them." Then it was that the Knight rose to his feet.
"And I refuse," he said, "to owe my wife to sacrilege, fraud, and falsehood." The Bishop leaned forward, gripping with both hands the arms of his chair.

His face was absolutely colourless; but his eyes, like blue steel, seemed to transfix the Knight, who could not withdraw his regard from those keen points of light.
The Bishop's whisper, when at length he spoke, was more alarming than if he had shouted.
"Fool!" he said.