ow, He would be too indulgent, it would be contrary
to His own justice.'

They slowly walked down the hill towards Les Artaud. The priest had
not opened his lips; but gradually he raised his head erect: he was no
longer trembling. As in the distance he caught sight of the Solitaire
looming blackly against the purplish sky, and the ruddy glow of the
tiles on the church, a faint smile came to his lips, while to his calm
eyes there rose an expression of perfect serenity.

Meantime the Brother was every now and then giving a vicious kick at the
stones that came in his way. Presently he turned to his companion:

'Is it all over this time?' he asked. 'When I was your age I was
possessed too. A demon was ever gnawing at me. But, after a time, he
grew weary of it, and took himself off. Now that he has gone I live
quietly enough.... Oh! I knew very well that you would go. For three
weeks past I have been keeping watch upon you. I used to look into the
garden through the breach in the wall. I should have liked to cut the
trees down. I have often hurled stones at them; it was delightful to
break the branches. Tell me, now, is it so very nice to be there?'

He made Abbe Mouret stop in the middle of the road, and glared at him
with a terrible expression of jealousy. The thought of the priest's
life in the Paradou tortured him. But the Abbe kept perfect silence, so
Archangias set off again, jeering as he went. Then, in a louder voice,
he said:

'You see, when a priest behaves as you have done, he scandalises every
other priest. I myself felt sullied by your conduct. However, you
are now behaving more sensibly. There is no need for you to make any
confession. I know what has happened well enough. Heaven has broken your
back for you, as it has done for so many others. So much the better! So
much the better!'

He clapped his hands triumphantly. But Abbe Mouret, immersed in deep
reverie, with a smile spreading over his whole face, did not even hear
him. When the Brother quitted him at the parsonage door, he went round
and entered the church. It was grey and gloomy, as on that terrible
rainy evening when temptation had racked him so violently. And it still
remained poverty-stricken and meditative, bare of all that gleaming
gold and sighing passion that had seemed to him to sweep in from the
countryside. It preserved solemn silence. But a breath of mercy seemed
to fill it.

Kneeling before the great Christ and bursting into tears,