Page:Cerise, a tale of the last century (IA cerisetaleoflast00whytrich).pdf/359

 Nor was the Marquise the only person under this consecrated roof who curbed unruly feelings with a strong and merciless hand. That priest, with his back to the little congregation, adjusting with trembling gestures the sacred symbols of his faith, had fought during the last hour or two such a battle as a man can only fight once in a lifetime; a battle that, if lost, yields him a prey to evil without hope of rescue; if won, leaves him faint, exhausted, bleeding, a maimed and shattered champion for the rest of his earthly life. Since sunrise he had wrestled fiercely with sin and self. They had helped each other lustily to pull him down, but he had prevailed at last. Though one insuperable barrier already existed between himself and the woman he loved so madly at the cost of his very soul, it was hard to rear another equally insurmountable, with his own hand; but it would insure her happiness—he resolved to do it, and therefore he was here.

So when Cerise and her lover advanced to the altar, and the Jesuit priest, whom they had imagined to be a stranger from Maria-Galante, turned round to confront them, in spite of his contracted features, in spite of the wan, death-like hue of his face, they recognised him at once, and exclaimed simultaneously, in accents of intense surprise, "Brother Ambrose!" and "Beaudésir!"

The sailors, too much taken aback to speak, gasped at each other in mute astonishment, nor did Slap-Jack, who had constituted himself in a manner director of the proceedings, recover his presence of mind till the conclusion of the ceremony.

If a corpse could be galvanised and set up in priest's robes to bless a loving couple whom Heaven has joined together, its benediction could scarcely be more passionless and mechanical than was that which Florian de St. Croix—the Brother Ambrose who had been the bride's confessor, the Beaudésir who had been the bridegroom's lieutenant—now pronounced over George Hamilton and Cerise de Montmirail. Not an eyelash quivered, not a muscle trembled, not a tone of emotion could be detected in his voice. Still young, still enthusiastic, still, though it was wild and warped and wilful, possessing a human heart, he believed honestly that he then bade farewell at once and for ever to earth and earthly things.