or the bottle, eagerly drained another glass of wine.

"You think that wine makes you happy, don't you, Padre?" she observed,
watching him gulp down the heavy liquor. "But it doesn't. It just
gives you what Padre Jose calls a false sense of happiness. And when
that false sense passes away--for everything unreal has just _got_ to
pass away--why, then you are more unhappy than you were before. Isn't
it so?"

The astonished Diego now regained his voice. "_Caramba_, girl!" he
ejaculated, "will you rein that runaway tongue!"

"No, Padre," she replied evenly, "for it is God who is talking to you.
Don't you hear Him? You ought to, for you are a priest. You ought to
know Him as well as the good man Jesus did. Padre, can you lay your
hands on the sick babies and cure them?"

The man squirmed uncomfortably for a moment, and then broke into
another brutal laugh. "Sick babies! _Caramba_! but we find it easier
to raise new babies than to cure sick ones! But--little _hada_!
_Hombre_! do _hadas_ have such voluptuous bodies, such plump legs!
_Madre de Dios_, girl, enough of your preaching! Come to me quick! I
hunger for you! Come!"

"No, Padre," she answered quietly, "I do not want to come to you. But
I want to talk to you--"

"_Dios y diablo_! enough of your gab! _Caramba_! with a Venus before
me do you think I yearn for a sermon? _Hombre_! delay it, delay it--"

"Padre," she interrupted, "you do not see _me._ You are looking only
at your bad thoughts of me."

"Ha! my thoughts, eh?" His laugh resembled the snort of an animal.

"Yes, Padre--and they are _very_ bad thoughts, too--they don't come
from God, and you are _so_ foolish to let them use you the way you do.
Why do you, Padre? for you don't have to. And you know you see around
you only the thoughts that you have been thinking. Why don't you think
good thoughts, and so see only good things?"

"Now Mary bless my soul!" he exclaimed in mock surprise. "Can it be
that I don't see a plump little witch before me, but only my bad
thoughts, eh? Ha! ha! _Caramba_! that is good! _Bien_, then," he
coaxed, "come to your poor, deluded padre and let him learn that you
are only a thing of thought, and not the most enchanting little piece
of flesh that ever caused a Saint to fall!"

The girl sat silent before him. Her smile had fled, and in its place
sadness and pity were written large upon her wistful face.

"Come, my little bundle of thought," he coaxed, holding out his fat,
hair