woman that Brian Luttrell
loves--for whose sake you gave up your inheritance--that you might not
turn her out. The mystery is solved. I see the motive now. You love this
woman."

"And if I have loved her, if I do love her," said Dino, passionately,
his whole face lighting up with impetuous feeling, and his hands
trembling as they clasped each other, "it is no sin to love."

The Prior gave him a long, steady gaze. "You have sacrificed your faith
to your love," he said, "and that is a sin. You have forgotten your
obedience to the Church for a woman's sake--and that is a sin. Lastly,
you come here professing a monk's vocation, yet acknowledging--with
reluctance--that this woman's face comes between you and your prayers. I
do not say that this is a sin, but I say that you had better leave us
to-morrow, for you have proved yourself unfit for the life that we lead
at San Stefano. Go back to Scotland and marry. Or, if you cannot do
that, we will give you money, and start you in some professional career;
your aims are too low, your will is too weak, for us."

Again the Prior was not quite in earnest. He wanted to try the strength
of his pupil's resolve. But when Dino said, "I will not leave you, I
will tend the vines and the goats at your door, but I will never go
away," the priest felt a revival of all the old tenderness which he had
been used to lavish silently on the brown-eyed boy who had come to him
from old Assunta.

"I will not go!" cried Dino. "I have no one in the world but you. Ah, my
father, will you never forgive me?"

"It is not my forgiveness you need," said the Prior, shortly. "But come,
the hour is late. We will give you shelter for the night, at least."

"Let me go to the chapel first," pleaded Dino, in a voice which had
suddenly grown faint. "I dared not enter it this morning, but now let me
pray there for a little while. I must ask forgiveness there."

"Pray there if you choose," said the Prior; "and pray for the penitence
which you have yet to learn. When that is won, then talk of
forgiveness."

He coldly withdrew the hand that Dino tried to kiss; he left the room
without uttering one word of comfort or encouragement. It was good for
his pupil, he thought, to be driven well-nigh to despair.

Dino, left to himself, remained for a few minutes in the posture in
which the Prior had left him; then rose and made his way, slowly and
feebly, to the little monastery chapel, where a solitary lamp swung
befo