"
"I blame him as long as the spoil is not restored."
"How do you know that it was spoil, after all?"
"I have examined more carefully than most men the records of the
civil wars in Italy; and I know that the ancestors of Fabio
d'Ascoli wrung from the Church, in her hour of weakness, property
which they dared to claim as their right. I know of titles to
lands signed away, in those stormy times, under the influence of
fear, or through false representations of which the law takes no
account. I call the money thus obtained spoil, and I say that it
ought to be restored, and shall be restored, to the Church from
which it was taken."
"And what does Fabio answer to that, brother?"
"I have not spoken to him on the subject."
"Why not?"
"Because I have, as yet, no influence over him. When he is
married, his wife will have influence over him, and she shall
speak."
"Maddalena, I suppose? How do you know that she will speak?"
"Have I not educated her? Does she not understand what her duties
are toward the Church, in whose bosom she has been reared?"
Luca hesitated uneasily, and walked away a step or two before he
spoke again.
"Does this spoil, as you call it, amount to a large sum of
money?" he asked, in an anxious whisper.
"I may answer that question, Luca, at some future time," said the
priest. "For the present, let it be enough that you are
acquainted with all I undertook to inform you of when we began
our conversation.
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