But first, you and I must come to an agreement. My sister must be in no doubt about the seriousness of the situation; she must never be left alone." "It won't come to that," said Paddy. "She's only a kid; it's not her fault she's ended up here. I'm sure you'll be able to explain the situation. After all, you're a bishop, and she's only a small child." "I don't think so," replied the archbishop. "I don't believe I've got any authority over her. And I'm not at all convinced she'd listen to anything I had to say." "That's got nothing to do with the Church." "No," said the bishop, "I'm sure it's nothing to do with your religion. But what I am wondering is how I'm supposed to explain to my poor, defenseless little sister that she's ended up in this situation. But I'll think of something. Oh, and you'd better pack some warm clothes as well. I know it's supposed to be sunny in Canada, but you never know." "Is this a hint for me to take her back to Lourdes?" "No, of course not." "All right. I'll think about what you've said, and we can discuss it again in the morning. In the meantime, the poor child is probably freezing. Let's go back to the hotel, at least she'll have a better chance of getting warm there. I'm sure she's cold." And thus, with no warning of any kind, my fate was decided for me: I was now my aunt Angela's responsibility, and Paddy would go off on his next expedition, while I would stay here for the next year and a half. I slept almost the entire day and night, and the following morning, after a short visit from the priest, who handed me the baby Jesus and a host of holy candles, we went back to Aunt Angela's hotel. I was told I was to stay on that bed and that I was not to get up for anyone, not even my father or mother, for at least two years. I couldn't remember anything at all about this period, but my aunt later told me that for the first few days I didn't look at the least bit curious. There were many other things I didn't remember, but I was very pleased to be back. That evening, Paddy returned with his usual mixture of enthusiasm and self-satisfaction, but now his face seemed more troubled than ever. "What happened?" I asked anxiously. He sighed. "I had to do a deal with the Archbishop, he threatened me with all kinds of things. Then we got that poor kid to sign something to say she'd been baptized and hadn't been abused or mistreated." "Mistreated?" I said, incredulously. "Yes. According to the archbishop, the devil can use a different form of magic that makes people think that they're in paradise, when all they're doing is falling into his clutches." "That's true," I remarked. "There's an amusing film about that very subject." "Yes, but the Archbishop got me to agree that if anything happened, and I should hear about it, I'd send her back to Lourdes as soon as I could." "That means there's no way she can escape," I replied angrily. "It's not fair!" "Of course it isn't, child. I didn't do anything wrong." "Even so, she'll never manage to escape." "You watch, she'll soon learn the ways of this devil." Then Aunt Angela told me about all the things that had happened since I had gone away. She'd been very much alone. However, she'd had a few visitors from time to time. The mother superior was furious about the way her flock were being neglected. She was convinced that these were good people and had a right to the same care that good people get everywhere in the world, while at the very least the Vatican owed them an explanation. She knew everything, thanks to the confessional, which is one of the most useful institutions of the Catholic Church, and all the rest of it was just a pretext so that nobody would be offended. But once she'd tried everything she could think of, she was reduced to going to the archbishop to help her parishioners. He received her just as insolently as he had done Paddy. However, he didn't dare to refuse to talk to the mother superior. "Do you know what happened?" said Aunt Angela. "The priest insisted on us sending the bishop to his house. We protested, but in the end I sent him the telegram asking him to come. He knew what was expected of him, you can be sure he did. It would have been better if he'd refused to come. But no, all the way here, while we were waiting for him, he kept saying: " 'What will be, will be,' " said Aunt Angela. "But I wasn't very happy with that answer." "Don't worry about it, he's too devout to have had an alternative plan. It would only have been pride if he'd let you see through him. How does Paddy look?" "Furious." "Why?" "Because he's worried about you." I was shocked by this answer, but I wasn't the least bit surprised. "I don't care about them, but you do." "The devil's in the details," I remarked. "And the details are usually right." "I know," said Aunt Angela, "I know. But don't worry. This time there's going to be a battle." "What for?" I asked. "Do you really think the archbishop is going to put me in an asylum for a year?" "No, that's not what I meant," replied Aunt Angela. "Just before he left, he spoke to me about your education. Your poor father was a great admirer of the Jesuits, he spoke of them a great deal when he was with us. He had a lot of books about them. He was told you were to be an excellent scholar and that your education was to be entrusted to the Jesuits. He would have liked you to study at the College of Clermont, where one of them teaches. I know what your poor father would have done." "He'd have done the right thing," I said, "but maybe in the meantime we could have sent us somewhere else. I don't like this hotel. And now that I'm going to be around here for a whole year, this is going to be the longest month of my life. Even today I'm a little queasy." "Don't worry," replied Aunt Angela, "you'll get used to it. Besides, you're going to get used to a whole lot of things in a very short time. You'll even learn to get used to the church." "I've seen what he's got inside the tabernacle." "Yes, of course you have. Just like when you were in Africa, you'll have to learn what's inside the tabernacle." "Even so, it doesn't seem very encouraging to me," I said. "And of course, you're right. But let's not worry about that. There's only one way of getting out of the situation. And that is to do exactly what we're told to do. So, if we ever get out of here, we'll talk about the devil, even about God and his saints, but we'll only talk about them in the right place. It's not very complicated. You can only speak about the devil in a dark corner of your own mind, while you mustn't talk about him outside. It's one of those things that mustn't be done, it would be wrong. So we've got to do it, because it's our only hope. To get out of the church's clutches, we must enter its domain, and the best way to do it is to put all our trust in the pope. You're very young, so you don't understand all this yet, but one day you will, I'm sure of that." There was a knock at the door. "Who can that be?" "It must be the priest," said Aunt Angela. It was. "If you would come into the hallway, please," he said, "I will have a word with you in private." "Why?" asked Aunt Angela. "I think it's more suitable to take your nephew into the hallway." "I don't know whether it's right to do that," replied Aunt Angela. "Excuse me, but I am the one responsible for the church, and I've been told to arrange the visit so that you have to leave before it's over. I don't want the mother superior, or anyone else, to be able to complain that I had too long a conversation with her godchild. When you come back, you will be able to have a long talk with your nephew, and then we'll see. Goodbye." He wasn't telling the truth. When we went back into the room, Aunt Angela asked me to tell her everything I could remember about what had happened in the church since I'd left.