Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the city room.djvu/92

 battle she would have to wage before she could find the peace she sought. A tender sympathy for the woman so courageously entering upon this warfare crept into the austere calmness of the look he fixed upon her as he ended the remarks which were a part of the impressive ceremonies of her reception in the great conventual order.

Ruth Herrick, sitting in a pew well toward the front, saw the look and wondered. To her the sacrifice seemed a worse than needless one. Earlier in the afternoon, as she had wandered through the old convent garden and marked the contrast of its peace and quiet to the city's roar, it had seemed to her that one might rest here contentedly for a time. She had felt almost in sympathy with the young nun whose dramatic farewell to the world she had come to see. Then she had gone into the crowded chapel, and her mood had changed as the ceremonies went on. They had brought before her very vividly all that conventual life implied.

From the journalistic point of view she rejoiced in their pathos and impressiveness, which would lend color and interest to her