lk to Dannie
and show him that he is free from any promise that Jimmy might have got
out of him. Will you?"

"A dying confession--" began the priest.

"Yes, but I know--" broke in Mary. "I saw them fight, and I heard Jimmy
till Dannie that he'd lied to him to separate us, but he turned right
around and took it back and I knew Dannie belaved him thin; but he
can't after Jimmy confissed it again to both of you."

"What do you mean by 'saw them fight?'" Father Michael was leaning
toward Mary anxiously.

Mary told him.

"Then that is the explanation to the whole thing," said the priest.
"Dannie did believe Jimmy when he took it back, and he died before he
could repeat to Dannie what he had told me. And I have had the feeling
that Dannie thought himself in a way to blame for Jimmy's death."

"He was not! Oh, he was not!" cried Mary Malone. "Didn't I live there
with them all those years? Dannie always was good as gold to Jimmy. It
was shameful the way Jimmy imposed on him, and spint his money, and
took me from him. It was shameful! Shameful!"

"Be calm! Be calm!" cautioned Father Michael. "I agree with you. I am
only trying to arrive at Dannie's point of view. He well might feel
that he was responsible, if after humoring Jimmy like a child all his
life, he at last lost his temper and dealt with him as if he were a
man. If that is the case, he is of honor so fine, that he would
hesitate to speak to you, no matter what he suffered. And then it is
clear to me that he does not understand how Jimmy separated you in the
first place."

"And lied me into marrying him, whin I told him over and over how I
loved Dannie. Jimmy Malone took iverything I had to give, and he left
me alone for fiftane years, with my three little dead babies, that died
because I'd no heart to desire life for thim, and he took my youth, and
he took my womanhood, and he took my man--" Mary arose in primitive
rage. "You naden't bother!" she said. "I'm going straight to Dannie
meself."

"Don't!" said Father Michael softly. "Don't do that, Mary! It isn't the
accepted way. There is a better! Let him come to you."

"But he won't come! He don't know! He's in Jimmy's grip tighter in
death than he was in life." Mary began to sob again.

"He will come," said Father Michael. "Be calm! Wait a little, my child.
After all these years, don't spoil a love that has been almost
unequaled in holiness and beauty, by anger at the dead. Let me go to
Dannie. We are goo