ords to Jose's itching ears.

An hour later the Secretary and the Cardinal-Bishop came out of the
room and left the office together. "Yes," the Secretary was saying,
"in the case of Wenceslas it was 'pull and percuniam' that secured him
his place. The Church did not put him there."

The Cardinal-Bishop laughed genially. "Then the Holy Ghost was not
consulted, I take it," he said.

"No," replied the Secretary grimly. "And he has so complicated the
already delicate situation in Colombia that I fear Congress will table
the bill prohibiting Free-masonry. It is to be deplored. Among all the
Latin Republics none has been more thoroughly Catholic than
Colombia."

"Is the Holy Father's unpublished order regarding the sale and
distribution of Bibles loyally observed there?" queried the
Cardinal-Bishop.

The door closed upon them and Jose heard no more. His day's duties
ended, he went to his room to write and reflect. But the intense
afternoon heat again drove him forth to seek what comfort he might
near the river. With his notebook in hand he went to the little park,
as was his frequent wont. An hour or so later, while he was jotting
down his remembrance of the conversation just overheard, together with
his own caustic and protesting opinions, his absorption was broken by
the strange child's accident. A few minutes later the notebook had
disappeared.

And now the thought of all this medley of personal material and secret
matters of Church polity falling into the hands of those who might
make capital of it, and thereby drag the Rincon honor through the
mire, cast the man prostrate in the dust.

CHAPTER 10

Days passed--days whose every dawn found the priest staring in
sleepless, wide-eyed terror at the ceiling above--days crowded with
torturing apprehension and sickening suggestion--days when his knees
quaked and his hands shook when his superiors addressed him in the
performance of his customary duties. No mental picture was too
frightful or abhorrent for him to entertain as portraying a possible
consequence of the loss of his journal. He cowered in agony before
these visions. He dared not seek the little park again. He feared to
show himself in the streets. He dreaded the short walk from his
dormitory to the Vatican. His life became a sustained torture--a
consuming agony of uncertainty, interminable suspense, fearful
foreboding. The cruelty of his position corroded him. His health
suffered, and his cassock h