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Dimly, and through clouds of uncertainty, I began to perceive that Kehler had ransacked the convents of Madrid for a suitable instrument, and that he was hard at work hypnotising the unfortunate girl’s mind, so as to prepare it for any suggestion he might have to make.

Before we reached Cuba I contrived to speak to the Sister apart. I found her reserved and distrustful of a heretic, as she had evidently been told to consider me. On my satisfying her that I had been brought up a Catholic, she became slightly more communicative, and revealed a disposition singularly sincere and devoted, but almost morbid in its detestation of Protestantism. She betrayed a feeling of horror at the idea of American domination in the Catholic island of Cuba, and it was in vain that I represented to her the generous tolerance accorded to our religion in the United States.

I did not dare to ask her the subject of her conferences with Kehler. To have hinted at the Bavarian’s true character would have been simply to forfeit her confidence in myself. I decided to reserve my efforts in this direction until our arrival in Havana, where I did not doubt that I should be able to find some responsible ecclesiastic who would undertake the investigation of Kehler’s antecedents.