"No, dear child," she replied very firmly indeed, "that is far from being the case. God has established His Church, one, holy, Catholic, and Apostolic, and that is the way of salvation that He has appointed."
"Then why aren't we all born into it?" demanded Zella, more from a desire to impress Reverend Mother with her logical mind than from any real wish for information.
"Faith is a free gift of God, which He bestows of His great mercy. But we can all pray for more faith, and it is a prayer that will never remain unanswered. The Apostles prayed that their faith might be increased, you know."
"Yes," eagerly replied Zella, who did not know. "And if one prays like that, and does one's best, it must be right. After all, I suppose it is better to be a good sincere heathen than a bad Christian."
"No, no, that is quite wrong idea," said Reverend Mother more firmly than ever. "Remember, there must be Truth somewhere, and it is better to be in the Truth, even if one has the misfortune not to live up to the amount of grace bestowed, than out of it."
Zella felt at least ten years older and wiser than Reverend Mother, and inquired rather incredulously:
"And do you really think it is better to be, say, a bad Catholic than a good Protestant?"
"Certainly I do; but you do not understand that, I see. It sounds to you narrow-minded and uncharitable, does it not?" said Reverend Mother, laughing with a whole-heartedness that rather disconcerted Zella, the more especially as Reverend Mother's diagnosis of her thoughts was a perfectly correct one. She felt so much less superior than before that it was a relief when the nun began to question her as to her various classes.
The conversation proceeded readily enough, though Zella was conscious of a slight undercurrent of disappointment that Reverend Mother apparently did not care to pursue the topic of Zella's religious views any farther; and at the end of twenty minutes the nun said kindly, but rising rather with the air of one who had brought a duty to its successful conclusion:
"Now, Zella, remember that, if ever you want to speak to me, you can write a little note and tell me so, and I will find time to come down to you."
"Oh, thank you!" cried Zella, her habitually pretty tones of gratitude over-emphasized from sheer nervousness.
"Any of the children may speak to me when they really wish it, and I am always especially glad to see the elder girls."
Rightly or wrongly, Zella interpreted this into an insinuation that the projected favour should not be looked upon as a personal and exclusive one, and immediately felt unreasonably dejected.
She did not quite know what she had expected as outcome of the interview, but felt vaguely that it had fallen short of the anticipations raised by the awe and envy with which such a privilege was always mentioned by the other girls.
She rallied her forces desperately as she prepared to open the door for Reverend Mother, in a last valiant effort to raise the tone of the interview to a higher level.
"Will you sometimes say a prayer for me?" she asked wistfully, lifting her dark grey eyes appealingly.
Most of the children gabbled a request of the sort on meeting most of the nuns, but the invariable formula was, "Pray for me, won't you?" or, if the suppliant were facetiously inclined, "Pray for my conversion, please, Mother."
The request had naturally hitherto been a strange one to Zella's lips, and the slight timidity in her manner and wording were not without effect.
Reverend Mother did not reply, as Zella had half expected she would, "I pray for all our children, dear," with the impersonal accent so beloved of convents, but answered warmly:
"Indeed I will, dear child, most especially; and you must pray, too, for yourself, that you may learn whatever you are meant to learn at the convent, and make good use of all the opportunities God gives you. He has designs on your soul, dear child, you may be sure of it."
Zella regarded as a special object of attention from the Almighty, was a pleasant object for Zella to contemplate, and her depression fled.
She ventured a final touch.
"Won't you give me the little cross on my forehead?" she asked, alluding to Reverend Mother's habitual form of greeting to the children.
Reverend Mother smiled, and traced the sign of the Cross with her thumb on the uplifted brow. She also murmured a quite unintelligible blessing, then disappeared down the long passage that led to the part of the house reserved for the community.
Zella returned to the recreation-room on the whole well pleased with herself.
To add to her elation, she found that the girls were disposed to treat her with a new friendliness.
"I say, you are lucky," said Dorothy Brady enviously. "You got a whole half-hour, didn't you?"
Zella had had considerably less, owing to Reverend Mother's lack of promptitude in making her appearance, but she saw her advantage and instantly seized it:
"Wasn't it kind of her?" she smiled, thus delicately implying the correctness of Dorothy's conjecture.
"Reverend Mother doesn't often see new girls, either," said Kathleen, the pretty Irish girl whom Zella was disposed to like.
'Are you starting a war Zella ?" laughed one of the younger ones.
Mary McNeill shoved her into silence. Zella felt rather than heard the muttered warning: "Shut up! don't you know she isn't a Catholic, she's a Protestant?"
"Can't Protestants get a vocation?" demanded the infant, unabashed.
"Of course not. Don't be silly." Zella felt annoyed. She had already had serious visions of the young heiress of Villetswood renouncing all the pomps and riches of this world and adopting the becoming veil and habit of the Order, and she was indignant at having it supposed that she, as a Protestant, was debarred from what these convent girls evidently considered as the highest summit of attainment in this life.
Her unformulated thought might have been translated into a determination that she must conform to the standards of her surroundings at all costs; and not only conform, but find herself placed considerably above the average line of conformity.
She prayed that night, with a strong sense of her own humility and desire for Truth, " Lord, increase my faith.'' Her complacency was only disturbed by a tiny involuntary petition that she found herself murmuring into the pillow when she had finished drawing the Almighty's attention to her state of spiritual receptiveness:
"And please do let Reverend Mother take an interest in me."
XIV
AM I never to make a real friend?" thought Zella despairingly when she had been at the convent some time, and found herself no nearer to this favourite vision of her school days.
Intimacies among the pupils were not encouraged. "Charity " might be, and was, enforced by every pious precept of the nuns, but it must be practised indiscriminately, as it were, and in equal measure towards all alike. Tête-à-tête conversations were absolutely forbidden, nor was any opportunity afforded for such in the ordered monotony of the days.
Zella was by this time on terms of easy chaff with most of her companions, having rapidly caught the tone prevalent amongst them, and learnt to alternate, as they did, between the free-and-easy camaraderie implied in flat contradiction or noisy argument, and the matter-of-course good-will expressed in an earnest request for prayers about a frightfully special intention.
For some time Zella was utterly in the dark as to what an "intention" might be, but characteristically uttered an emphatic assent without making any inquiry.
She was enlightened one day by Kathleen.
"I'll