n,
who had been lost in a fit of deep abstraction, looked up and shook
his head as the servant quitted the room. "I shall not stay here," he
said quietly. "It is impossible."

Paul pointed to the clock. "You have more to tell me," he said,
"and it is already late. If you are staying at the monastery of
St. Bernard, it is nearly eight miles away, and you cannot possibly
return."

"I have not so far to go," Father Adrian answered, "and this is the
hour I always choose for walking. Do you wish to hear the rest of your
father's confession?"

Paul stood on the hearthrug with bowed head and folded arms. "I am
ready!" he said; "go on!"

Father Adrian remained silent for nearly a quarter of an hour; then he
recommenced his story.

"'From the time of the old Count's visit,' your father went on, 'I
noticed a gradual change in Irene. She grew thin and pale and nervous,
disliking more and more, every day, to go out, and becoming suddenly
averse to all our previous pursuits and pleasures. We mixed amongst
a Bohemian set in Paris, and we had a good many acquaintances of a
certain sort. Amongst them was a man whom I always disliked, yet who
managed somehow to establish himself upon terms of intimacy with us.
His name was Count Victor Ferdinand Hirsfeld, and his nationality was
rather a puzzle to me, for he chose to maintain, without any apparent
reason, a sort of mystery about it. With Irene he was ever more
intimate than with me, and more than once I noticed references in
their conversation which seemed to point to some previous acquaintance
between them. I asked Irene no questions, for I trusted her but I
watched Count Hirsfeld closely. I felt convinced that, under the mask
of friendship, he was trying to win Irene from me, and though I never
for one moment believed that he would succeed, I was anxious to obtain
some proof of his intentions, that I might punish him. Often after his
visits, which seemed to be carefully chosen for a time at which I was
nearly certain to be out, I found Irene in tears; but when I sought to
make her explain, she had always some excuse.

"'We had lived together for three years when, without any warning,
Irene left me. I came home one night from a dinner at the English
Embassy, and found her gone. There was no message, not a single line
of adieu, not a ghost of a clew by which I could trace her. It was a
shock to me; but when the first wrench was over, I knew that it was
something of a relief. In