Page:Marie Corelli - the writer and the woman (IA mariecorelliwrit00coat).pdf/257

 Fabien Doucet's mother that the boy is cured, and, to prove it, little Fabien, the former cripple, speeds gaily to the home of the Patoux family, strong and well.

Unconscious of the remarkable cure that has awed and amazed the townsfolk of Rouen, the Cardinal, accompanied by Manuel, proceeds to Paris and to the residence of his niece, Angela Sovrani, an artist famous throughout Europe. In Paris many interesting persons are brought together, mainly in Angela Sovrani's studio. One remarkable character is the Abbé Vergniaud, a brilliant preacher, witty, eloquent, and sarcastic, but an atheist for all that. In his conversations with Angela he endeavors to justify his position, but the girl insists upon the depressing and wretched nature of his soulless creed. Vergniaud frankly admits his unbelief to Cardinal Bonpré. He also makes a confession and a declaration. In his early days, twenty-five years before, he had betrayed and deserted a woman, long since dead. Her son, however, has grown to manhood with the determination to avenge the mother's wrong, and the Abbé goes in daily fear of assassination at his hands. Yet the Abbé Vergniaud shows that he is far from being a wholly evil man. He declares his determination to retrieve the past so far as he can and