I told them that
they must leave on the night before Soult made his attack. Of course he
will summon the town, and the bishop will, of course, refuse to surrender,
and you may be sure the French will attack on the following day. They left
me alone with Lorenza for a time, and I took that opportunity of telling
her about your plan, and what you wanted, and she promised to procure you
the dress of an ecclesiastic to-morrow. I told her that you were about my
size and height.
"She knew your cousin personally, and was very fond of her, and therefore
entered all the more readily into our plans to get her out. She said that
she disappeared suddenly some months ago, and that her mother had given
out that she had been suddenly seized with the determination to enter a
convent, much against her own wishes. Lorenza felt sure that this was not
true, for she knew that your cousin had heard from her father much about
the Reformed religion, and was in her heart disposed that way. The mother
is engaged to be married to a nobleman who is one of the bishop's warmest
supporters, and the general idea was that Mary O'Connor had been forced
into a nunnery against her will. I sat talking with them until late last
night, and they would not hear of my leaving, especially as they said that
the town was full of bands of ruffians, who traversed the streets,
attacking and robbing anyone of respectable appearance.
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