Page:Heavens!.djvu/141

 “Why don’t you answer me?” he said, growing impatient.

“I am extremely surprised, sir baron, Heavens began, trying to collect his senses to give a careful answer. You seem to be altogether under a mistake. There is an infant in my house, certainly; but it is the child of a poor workwoman, who is related to Naninka, my housekeeper.”

The baron looked at him very penetratingly. Large drops of sweat stood out on the brow of the poor story-teller. He could not for the world have lifted his eyes of the baron’s face.

“Why do you lower your eyes in such confusion?” urged the baron. “If what you tell me is true, then look me straight in the face, as one honest man does another.” A painful sigh escaped Father Cvok’s troubled breast.

“I would never have thought you capable of dealing in untruths,” said the baron, reproachfully. “You will have no success either in this line, reverend sir; for you are but a clumsy dissembler.”

Heavens trembled like a boy caught by the field-watcher in the act of picking peas in a strange field.

“What did Jenny write to you—what did she say?” repeated the baron, urgently.

“That is a secret, sir—a secret,” replied Father Cvok, trying to get himself out of the difficulty; “and I hope you will, as a gentleman, respect a secret.”

“You ought to have told me so at once, and I should certainly have been more moderate in my questions. A secret between you and Jenny must, of course, be respected. I am only glad that the little boy is well. What is his name?”

“Joseph.”