Page:Lord of the World - Benson - 1908.djvu/154

124 no time to dawdle. You understand that you are to remain in Rome for the present?"

"I have made all arrangements for that, your Eminence."

"That is very well. . . . We are pleased with you here, Father Franklin. The Holy Father has been greatly impressed by your comments. You have foreseen things in a very remarkable manner."

Percy flushed with pleasure. It was almost the first hint of encouragement he had had. Cardinal Martin went on.

"I may say that you are considered our most valuable correspondent—certainly in England. That is why you are summoned. You are to help us here in future—a kind of consultor: any one can relate facts; not every one can understand them. . . . You look very young, father. How old are you?"

"I am thirty-three, your Eminence."

"Ah! your white hair helps you.... Now, father, will you come with me into my room? It is now eight o'clock. I will keep you till nine—no longer. Then you shall have some rest, and at eleven I shall take you up to his Holiness."

Percy rose with a strange sense of elation, and ran to open the door for the Cardinal to go through.

At a few minutes before eleven Percy came out of his little white-washed room in his new ferraiuola, soutane and buckle shoes, and tapped at the door of the Cardinal's room.