The Sin That Was His

CHAPTER XVIII—THE CALL IN THE NIGHT CHAPTER XVIII—THE CALL IN THE NIGHT I T was very dark here in the front room, and somehow the darkness seemed tangible to the touch, like something oppressive, like the folds of a pall that was spread over him, and which he could not thrust aside. And it was still, and very quiet—save for the voices, and save that it seemed he could hear that faltering, irregular step from the rear room, where there was no longer any step to hear. Surely it would be daylight soon—the merciful daylight. The darkness and the night were meant only for sleep, and it was an eternity since he had slept—no, not an eternity, only a week—it was only a week since he had slept. No, that was not true either—there had been hours, not many of them, but there had been hours when his eyes had been closed and he had not been conscious of his surroundings, but those hours had been even more horrible than when he had tossed on his bed awake. They had brought neither rest nor oblivion—they were full of dreams that were hideous—and the dreams would not leave him when he was awake—and the sleep when it came was a curse because the dreams remained to cast an added blight upon his wakefulness—and he had come even to fight against sleep and to resist it because the dreams remained. Dreams! There was always the dream of the Walled Place which—no! Not that— now! Not that! Yes! The dream of the Walled Place. See—it went like this: He was in a sort of cavernous gloom in which he could not see very distinctly, but he was obsessed with the knowledge that there were hidden things from which he must escape. So he would run frantically around and around, following four square walls which were so high that the tops merged into the gloom; and the walls, as he touched them with his hands, seeking an opening, were wet with a slime that grew upon them. Then, looming out of the centre of this place, he would suddenly see what it was that he was running away from. There was a form, a human form, with something black over its head, that swayed to and fro, and was suspended from a bar that reached across from one wall to another; and on the top of this bar there roosted a myriad winged creatures like gigantic bats, only their eyes blazed, and they had enormous claws—and suddenly these vampires would rise with a terrifying crackling of their wings, and shrill, abominable screams, and swirl and circle over him, drawing nearer and nearer until his blood ran cold—and then, shrieking like a maniac, he would run again around and around the walls, beating at the slime until his hands bled. And the screaming things with outstretched talons followed him, and he stumbled and fell, and fell again, and shrieked out in his terror of these inhuman vultures that had roosted above the swaying thing with the black-covered head—and just as they were settling upon him there was an opening in the wall where there had been no opening before, and with his last strength he struggled toward it—and the way was blocked. The opening had become a gate that was all studded with iron spikes which if he rushed upon it would impale him, and which Valerie was closing—and as she closed it her head was averted, and one hand was thrown across her eyes, its palm toward him, as though she would not look upon his face. Raymond's hands were wet with perspiration. They slipped from the arms of his chair, and hung downward at his sides. What time was it? It had been midnight when he had risen fully dressed from his bed in the rear room—that he occupied now that they had taken the man away to jail—and had come in here to sit at the desk. Since then the clock had struck many times, the half hours, and the hours. Ah—listen! It was striking again. One—two—three! Three o'clock! It was still a long way off, the daylight—the merciful daylight. The voices did not plague him so constantly in the warmth of the sunshine. Three o'clock! It would be five o'clock before the dawn came. They had changed, those voices, in the last week—at least there was a new voice that had come, and an old one that did not recur so insistently. “Father—Father François Aubert—help me—I do not understand”—yes, that was still dinning forever in his ears; but, instead of that voice which said some one was to be hanged by the neck until dead, the new voice had quite a different thing to say. It was the voice of the “afterwards.” Hark! There it was now: “What fine and subtle shade of distinction is there between being hanged and imprisoned for life; what difference does it make, what difference could it make, what difference will it make—why do you temporise?” He had fought with all his strength against that “afterwards”—and it was stronger than he. He could not evade the issue that was flung at him, and flung again and again until his brain writhed in agony with it. He was a gambler, but he was not a blind gambler. He did not want the man to lose his life, or his freedom for all of life—he did not want to lose his own life. While the appeal was pending something might happen, a thousand things might happen, there was always, always a chance. He would not throw away that chance—only a fool who had lost his nerve would do that. But he was not blind. The chance was one where the odds against him staggered him—there was so little chance that, fight as he would to escape it, logic and plain common sense had forced upon him the “afterwards.” And these days while the appeal was pending were like remorseless steps that led on and on to end only upon the brink of a yawning chasm, whose depth and whose blackness were as the depth and blackness of hell, and over which he sprang suddenly erect, his head flung back, the strong jaws clamped like a vise. Who had brought this torture upon him? He could not sleep! He knew no repose! God, or devil, or power infernal—who was it? Neither sleep nor repose might be his, but he was unbroken yet, and he could still fight! He asked only that—that the author of this torment stand before him—and fight! Why should he, unless the one meagre hope that something might happen in the meantime be fulfilled, why should he stand faced with the choice of swinging like a felon from the gallows, or of allowing that other innocent man to go to his doom? Yes, why should he submit to this torture, when that scarred-faced blackguard had brought his death upon himself—why should he submit to it, when it was so easy to escape it all! Once, that night in Ton-Nugget Camp, he had flung down the gauntlet in the face of God, and in the face of hell, and in the face of man, and in the face of beast. Was he a weakling and a fool now who had not sense enough to seize his opportunity to be quit of this, and to go his way, and live again the full, red-blooded, reckless life that he had lived since he was a boy, and that now, a young man still, beckoned to him with allurements as yet untasted! To-morrow—no, to-day when the daylight came—he had only to borrow Bouchard's boat, and the boat upturned would be found, and St. Mar-leau would mourn the loss of the good, young Father Aubert whose body had been swept out to sea, and the law would take its course on the man in the condemned cell, and Three-Ace Artie would be as free and untrammelled as the air—yes, and a coward, and a crawling thing, and—the paroxysm of fury passed. He sagged against the desk. This was the “afterwards”—but why should it come now! Between now and then there was a chance that something might intervene. He had only been trying to delude himself when he had said that in a life sentence there was all of time to plan and plot—he knew that. And he knew, too, that he was no more content that the man should be imprisoned for life than that the man should hang—that one was the equal of the other. He knew that this “all of time” was ended when the appeal was decided. He knew all that—that voice would not let him juggle with myths any more. But that moment had not come yet—there were still weeks before it would come—and in those weeks there lay a hope, a chance, a gambling chance that something might happen. And even in the appeal there lay a hope too, not that the sentence might be commuted to life imprisonment, that changed nothing now, but that they might perhaps after all consider the man's condition sufficient reason for not holding him to account for murder, and might therefore, instead, place him under medical treatment somewhere until, if ever, he recovered. He, Raymond, had not struck the man, he had not in even a remote particular been responsible for the man's wound, or the ensuing condition, and if the man were turned over to medical supervision the man automatically ceased to have any claim upon him. But that was not likely to happen—it was only one of those thousand things that might happen—nothing was likely to happen except that the man would be hanged. And when that time came, if the appeal were lost and every one of those thousand chances swept away, and the only thing that could save the man's life would be to—God, would he never stop this! Would his mind never, even through utter exhaustion, cease its groping in this horrible turmoil! On, on, on! His brain was remorselessly driven on! It was like—like a slave that, already lacerated and bleeding, was lashed on again to renewed effort by some monstrous, brutal and inhuman master! Yes, when that time came, and if that chance were gone, and supposing he gave himself up to stand in the other's place, could he in any way evade the rope, wriggle away from that dangling noose? Was there a loophole in the evidence anywhere? If only in some way he could prove that the act had been committed in self-defence! He had feared to risk such a plea that night, because he had feared that his own past would condemn him out of hand; and, moreover, however that might have been, the man lying in the road, whom he had thought dead, had seemed to offer the means of washing his hands for good and all of the whole matter. Self-defence! Ha, ha! Listen to those devils laugh! It was his own hand that had tied the knot in the noose so that it would never slip—it was he who had so cunningly supplied all the attendant details that irrevocably placed the stamp of robbery and murder upon the doings of that night. Here there was no delusion; here, where delusion was sought again, there was no delusion—if he gave himself up he would hang—hang by the neck until he was dead—and, since he had desecrated God's holy places, he would hang without the mercy of God upon his soul. Well, what odds did that make—whether there was mercy of God upon his soul-or not! Was there anything in common between—no, that was not what he had to think about now—it was quite another matter. Suppose, when he was forced to fling down his hand finally, that instead of giving himself up, or instead of making it appear that the good, young Father Aubert was dead—suppose that he simply made an escape from St. Marleau such as he had planned for Henri Mentone that night? He could at least secure a few hours' start, and then, from somewhere, before it was too late, send back, say, a written confession. He could always do that. Surely that would save the man. They would hunt for him, Raymond, as they would hunt for a wild beast that had run amuck, and they would hunt for him for the rest of his life, and in the end they might even catch him—but that was the chance he would have to accept. Yes, here was another way—only why did not this way bring rest, and repose, and satisfaction, and sleep? And why ask the question? He knew—he knew why! It was—Valérie. It was not a big way, it was not a man's way—and in Valerie's eyes at the last, not absolving him, not even that she might endure the better, for it could not intimately affect her, there was left to him only the one redeeming act, the one thing that would lift him above contempt and loathing, and that was that she should know him—for a man . Life, the mere act of breathing, of knowing a concrete existence, was not everything; it did not embrace everything, it was not even a state that was not voluntarily to be surrendered to greater things, to—— “A fool and a woman's face, and blatant sophistry, and mock heroics!”—that inner monitor, with its gibe and sneer, was back again. Its voice, too, must make itself heard! He raised his hands and pressed them tight against his throbbing temples. This was hell's debating society, and he must listen to the arguments and decide upon their merits and pronounce upon them, for he was the presiding officer and the decision remained with him! How they gabbled, and shrieked, and whispered, and jeered, and interrupted each other, and would not keep order—those voices! Though now for the moment that inner voice kept drowning all the others out. “You had your chance! If you hadn't turned squeamish that night when all you needed to do was to hold a pillow over the man's face for a few minutes, you wouldn't have had any of this now! How much good will it do you what she thinks—when they get through burying you in lime under the jail walls!” It was dark, very dark here in the room. That was the window over there in that direction, but there was not even any grayness showing, no sign yet of daylight—no sign yet of daylight. Why would they not let him alone, these voices, until the time came when he must act? That was all he asked. In the interval something might—his hands dropped to his sides, and he half slipped, half fell into his chair, and his head went forward over the desk. Was all that to begin over again—and commence with the dream of the Walled Place! No, no; he would not let it— he would not let it! He would think about something else; force himself to think—rationally—about something else. Well then, the man in the condemned cell, whom he had not dared refuse to visit, and whom he had gone twice that week to see? No—-not that, either! The man was always sitting on that cursed cot with his hands clasped dejectedly between his knees, and the iron bars robbed the sunlight of warmth, and it was cold, and the man's eyes haunted him. No—not that, either! He had to go and see the man again to-morrow—and that was enough—and that was enough! Well then, Mother Blondin? Yes, that was better! He could even laugh ironically at that—at old Mother Blondin. Old Mother Blondin was falling under the spell of the example set by the good, young Father Aubert! Some of the old habitués, he had heard, were beginning to grumble because it was becoming difficult to obtain whisky at the tavern. The Madame Bouchards were crowding the habitues out; and the old woman on the hill, even if with occasional sullen and stubborn relapses, was slowly yielding to the advances of St. Marleau that he had inaugurated through the carpenter's v/ife. Ah—he had thought to laugh at this, had he! Laugh! He might well keep his head buried miserably in his arms here upon the desk! Laugh! It brought instead only a profound and bitter loneliness. He was alone, utterly alone, isolated and cut off in a world where there was the sound of no human voice, the touch of no human hand, alone—amidst people whose smiles greeted him on every hand, amidst people who admired and loved him, and listened reverently to the words of God that fell from his lips. But they loved, and admired, and gave their friendship, not to the man he was, but to the man they thought he was—to the good, young Father Aubert. That was what was actuating even Mother Blondin! And the life that he had led as the good, young Father Aubert was being held up to him now as in a mental mirror that lay bare to his gaze his naked soul. They loved him, these people; they had faith in him—and a pure, unswerving faith in the religion, and in the God as whose holy priest he masqueraded! Raymond's lips twisted in pain. The love of these people struck to the heart, and the pang hurt. It would have been a glad thing to have won this love—for himself. And he was requiting what they gave in their ignorance by defiling what meant most in life to them—the holy things they worshipped. It was strange—strange how of late he had sought, in a sort of pitiful atonement for the wrong he had done them, to put sincerity into the words that, before, he had only mumbled at the church altar! Yes, he had earned their love and their respect, and he was the good, young Father Aubert, and the life he had led amongst them was a blasphemous lie—but it had not been the motives of a hypocrite that had actuated him. It had not been that the devil desired to pose as a saint. He stood acquitted before even God of that. He had sought only, fought only, asked only—for his life. A sham, a pretence, a lie—it was abhorrent, damnable—it was not even Three-Ace Artie's way—and he was chained to it in every word and thought and act. There—that thing that loomed up through the darkness there a few inches from him—that was one of the lies. That was a typewriter he had rented in Tour-nayville and had brought back when returning from his last visit to the jail. Personal letters had begun to arrive for Father François Aubert. He might duplicate a signature, but he could not imitate pages of the man's writings. And he could not dictate a letter to-the man's mother —and meet Valérie's eyes. Valérie! Out in that world where he was set apart, out in that world of inhuman isolation, this was the loneliness that was greatest of all. Valérie! Valérie! It seemed as though he were held in some machiavellian bondage, free to move and act, free in all things save one—he could not pass the border of his prison-land. But he, Raymond Chapelle, could look out over the border of his prison-land, and watch this woman, whose face was pure and beautiful, as she walked about, and talked, and was constantly in the company of a young priest, who was the good, young Father Aubert, the Curé of St. Marleau. And because he had watched her hungrily for many days, and knew the smile that came so gladly to the sweet lips, and because he had looked into the clear, steadfast eyes, and listened to her voice, and because she was just Valérie, he had come to the knowledge of a great love—and a great, torturing, envious jealousy of this man, cloaked in priestly garb, who was forever at her side. His lips moved, but no sound came from them. Valérie! Valérie! Why had she not come into his life before! Before—when? Before that night at Mother Blondin's? Was he not man enough to look the truth in the face! That night was only a culminating incident of a life that went back many years to the days when—when there had been no Valérie either! But it was too late to think of that now—now that Valérie had come, come as a final, terrible punishment, holding up before him, through bitter contrast, the hollow worthlessness of the stakes that, when the choice had been freely his, he had chosen to play for! Valérie! Valérie! His soul was calling out to her. A life with Valérie! What would it not have meant? The dear love that she might have given him—the priceless love that he might have won! Gone! Gone forever! No, it was not gone, for it had never been. He thanked God for that. Yes, there must be a God who had brought this about, for while he flouted this God in the dress of this God's priest, this God utilised that very act to save Valérie, who trusted this God, from the misery and sorrow and hopelessness that must have come to her with love. She could not love a priest; there could be no thought of such a thing for Valérie. This God had set that barrier there—to protect her. Yes, he thanked God for that; he thanked God he had not brought this hurt upon her—and those minions of hell, who tried to tantalise, and with their insidious deviltry tried to make him think otherwise, were powerless here. But that did not appease the yearning; that did not answer the cry of his heart and soul. Valérie! Valérie! Valérie! He was calling to her with all his strength from the border of that prison-land. Valérie! Valérie! Would his voice not reach her! Would she not turn her head and smile! Valérie! Valérie! He wanted her now in his hour of agony, in this hour of terrible loneliness, in this hour when his brain rocked and reeled on the verge of madness. How still it was—and how dark! There were no voices now—only the voice of his soul calling, calling, calling for Valérie—calling for what he could never have—calling for the touch of her hand to guide him—calling for her smile to help him on his way. Yes, Valérie—he was calling Valérie—he was calling to her from the depths of his being. Out into the night, out into the everywhere, he was flinging his piteous, soundless cry, and God, if God would, might listen, and know that His revenge was taken; and hell might listen, and shriek its mirth—they would not silence him. Valérie! Valérie! No, there was no answer. There would never be an answer—but he would always call. Through the years to come, if there were those years to reckon with, he would call as he was calling now. Valérie! Valérie! Valérie! She would not hear—she would not answer—she would not know. But he would call—because he loved her. A sob shook his bowed shoulders. A hand in agony gathered and crushed a fold of flesh from the forehead that lay upon it. Valérie! Valérie! He did not cry out. He made no sound. It was still, still as the living death in that prison-land—and then—and then he was swaying to his feet, and clutching with both hands at the desk, for support. Valérie! The door was open, and a soft light filled the room. Valérie! Valérie was standing there on the threshold, holding a lamp in her hand. It was phantasm! A vision! It was not real! It was not Valérie! His mind was a broken thing at last! It was not Valérie—but that was Valérie's voice—that was Valérie's voice. The lamp shook a little unsteadily in her hand. “Did you call?” she asked. He did not answer—only looked at her, as though in truth she were a vision that had come to him. She was in dressing-gown; and her hair, loosely knotted, framed her face in dark, waving tresses; and her eyes were wide, startled and perplexed, as they fixed upon him. “I—I thought I heard you call,” she faltered. All the gladness, all the joy in life, all that the world could hold seemed for an instant his. All else was forgotten—all else but that singing in his heart—all else but that fierce, elemental, triumphant, mighty joy lifting him high to a pinnacle that reared itself supreme, commanding and immortal, far beyond the reach of that sea of torment which had engulfed him. Valérie had heard him call—and she had answered—and she was here. Valérie was here—she had come to him. Valérie had heard him call—and she was here. And then beneath his feet that pinnacle, so supreme, commanding and immortal, seemed to dissolve away, and that sea of torment closed over him again, and all those voices that plagued him, mocking, jeering, screaming, shrieking, were like a horrible requiem ringing in his ears. She had heard him call—and he had made no sound—only his soul had spoken.. And she had answered. And she was here—here now—standing there on the threshold. Why? He dared not answer. It was a blessed thing, a wonderful, glorious thing—-and it was a terrible thing, a thing of misery and despair. What was he doing now— answering that “why”! No, no—it was not true—it could not be true. He had thanked God that it could not be so. It was not that— that was not the reason she had heard him call—that was not the reason she was here. It was not! It was not! It was only those insidious—— He heard himself speaking; he was conscious that his voice by some miracle was low, grave, contained. “No, Mademoiselle Valérie, I did not call.” The colour was slowly leaving her cheeks, and into her eyes came creeping confusion and dismay. “It—it is strange,” she said nervously. “I was asleep, and I thought I heard you call for—for help, and I got up and lighted the lamp, and——” Was that his laugh—quiet, gentle, reassuring? Was he so much in command of himself as that? Was it the gambler, or the priest, or—great God!—the lover now? She was here—she had come to him. “It was a dream, Mademoiselle Valérie,” he was saying. “A very terrible dream, I am afraid, if I was the subject of it; but, see, it is nothing to cause you distress, and to-morrow you will laugh over it.” She did not reply at once. She was very pale now; and her lips, though tightly closed, were quivering. Nor did she look at him. Her eyes were on the floor. Her hand mechanically drew and held the dressing-gown closer about her throat. He had not moved from the side of the desk, nor she from the threshold of the door—and now she looked up suddenly, and held the lamp in her hand a little higher, and her eyes searched his face. “It must be very late—very, very late,” she said steadily. “And you have not gone to bed. There is something the matter. What is it? Will you tell me?” “But, yes!” he said—and smiled. “But, yes—I will tell you. It is very simple. I think perhaps I was overtired. In any case, I was restless and could not sleep, and so I came in here, and—well, since I must confess—I imagine I finally fell asleep in my chair.” “Is that all?” she asked—and there was a curious insistence in her voice. “You look as though you were ill. Are you telling me all?” “Everything!” he said. “And I am not ill, Mademoiselle Valérie”—he laughed again—“you would hear me complain fast enough if I were! I am not a model patient.” She shook her head, as though she would not enter into the lightness of his reply; and again her eyes sought the floor. And, as he watched her, the colour now came and went from her cheeks, and there was trouble in her face, and hesitancy, and irresolution. “What is it, Mademoiselle Valérie?”—his forced lightness was gone now. She was frightened, and nervous, and ill at ease—that she should be standing here like this at this hour of night, of course. Yes, that was it. Naturally that would be so. He lifted his hand and drew it heavily across his forehead. She was frightened. If he might only take her in his arms, and draw her head to his shoulder, and hold her there, and soothe her! It seemed that all his being cried to him to do that. “Well, why don't you?”—that inner voice was flashing the suggestion quick upon him—“well, why don't you? You could do it as a priest, in the rôle of priest, you know—like a father to one of his flock. Go ahead, here's your chance—be the priest, be the priest! Don't you want to hold her in your arms—be the priest, be the priest!” She had not answered his question. He found himself answering it for her. “What is it, Mademoiselle Valérie? You must not let a dream affect you, you know. It is gone now. And you can see that——” “It is strange”—she spoke almost to herself. “I—I was so sure that I heard you call.” Why was he not moving toward her? Why was he clinging in a sort of tenacious frenzy to the desk? Why was he not obeying the promptings of that inner voice? It would be quite a natural thing to do what that voice prompted—and Valérie, Valérie who would never be his, would for a moment, snatched out of all eternity, be in his arms. “But you must not let such a thing as a dream affect you”—he seemed to be speaking without volition of his own, and he seemed stupidly able to say but the same thing over again. “And, see, it is over, and you are awake now to find that no one is really in trouble after all.” And then she raised her head—and suddenly, but as though she were afraid even of her own act, as though she still fought against some decision she had forced upon herself, she walked slowly forward into the room, and set the lamp down upon the desk. “Yes, there is some one in trouble”—the words came steadily, but scarcely above a whisper; and her hand was tense about the white throat now, where before it had mechanically clutched at the dressing-gown. “I am in trouble—Father Aubert.” “You—Valérie!” He was conscious, even in his startled exclamation, of a strange and disturbing prescience. Father Aubert—he could not remember when she had called him that before— Father Aubert. It was very rarely that she called him that, it was almost always Monsieur le Curé. And he—her name—he had called her Valérie—not Mademoiselle Valérie—but Valérie, as once before, when she had stood out there in the hall the night they had taken that man away, her name had sprung spontaneously to his lips. “Yes,” she said, and bowed her head. “I am in trouble, father; for I have sinned.” “Sinned—Valérie”—the words were stumbling on his lips. How fast that white throat throbbed! Valérie, pure and innocent, meant perhaps to confess to— Father Aubert. Well, she should not, and she would not! Not that! She should not have to remember in the “afterwards” that she had bared her soul at the shrine of profanity. Back again into his voice he forced a cheery, playful reassurance. “It cannot be a very grievous sin that Mademoiselle Valérie has been guilty of! Of that, I am sure! And to-morrow——” “No, no!” she cried out. “You do not know! See, be indulgent with me now, father—I am in trouble—in very deep and terrible trouble. I—I cannot even confess and ask you for absolution—but you can help me—do not try to put me off—I—I may not have the courage again. See, I—I am not very brave, and I am not very strong, and the tears are not far off. Help me to do what I want to do.” “Valérie!” he scarcely breathed her name. Help her to do what she wanted to do! There was another prescience upon him now; but one that he could not understand, save that it seemed to be pointing toward the threshold of a moment that he was to remember all his life. “Sit down there in your chair, father, please”—her voice was very low again. “Sit there, and let me kneel before you.” He stepped back as from a blow. “No, Valérie, you shall not kneel to me”—he did not know what he was saying now. Kneel! Valérie kneel to him! “You shall not kneel to me, I——” “ Yes! ” The word came feverishly. The composure that she had been fighting to retain was slipping from her. “Yes—I must! I must!” She was close upon him, forcing him back toward the chair. Her eyes, dry and wide before, were swimming with sudden tears. “Oh, don't you understand! Oh, don't you understand! I am not kneeling to you as a man, I am kneeling to you as—as a—a priest —a priest of God—for—for I have sinned.” She was on her knees—and, with a mental cry of anguish, Raymond slipped down into the chair. Yes, he understood—now—at last! He understood what, pray God, she should never realise he understood! She—Valérie—cared. And she was trying now—God, the cruelty of it!—and she was trying now to save herself, to protect herself, by forcing upon herself an actual physical acceptance of him as a priest. No! It was not so! It could not be so! He did not understand! He would not have it so! He would not! It was only hell's trickery again—only that—and—— “Lay your hands on my head, father.” She caught his hands and lifted them, and laid them upon her bowed head—and as his hands touched her she seemed to tremble for an instant, and her hands tightened upon his. “Hold them there for a little while, father,” she murmured—and took her own hands away, and clasped them before her hidden face. Raymond's countenance was ashen as he bent forward. What had that voice prompted him to do? Be the priest? Well, he was being the priest now—and he knew torment in the depths of a sacrilege at last before which his soul shrank back appalled. The soft hair was silken to the touch of his hands, and yet it burned and seared him as with brands of fire. It was Valérie's hair. It was Valérie's head that was bowed before him. It was Valérie, the one to whom his soul had called, who was kneeling to him—as a priest of God—to save herself! “Say the Pater Noster with me, father,” she whispered. He bent his head still lower—lower now that she might not by any chance glimpse his face. Like death it must look. He pressed his hands in assent upon her head—but it was Valérie's voice alone that faltered through the room. “.... Sanctificetur nomen tuum —hallowed be Thy name... fiat voluntas tua —Thy will be done.... et dimitte nobis débita nostra —and forgive us our trespasses... et ne nos inducas in tentationem —and lead us not into temptation... sed libera nos a malo —but deliver us from evil... Amen.” The lamp burned upon the desk; it lighted up the room—but before Raymond's eyes was only a blur, and nothing was distinct. And there was silence—silence for a long time. And then Valérie spoke again. “I am stronger now,” she said. “I—I think God showed me the way. You have been very good to me to-night—not to question me—just to let me have my way. And now bless me, father, and I will go.” Bless Valérie—ask God's blessing on Valérie—would that be profanation? God's blessing on Valérie! Ay, he could ask that! Profligate, sinner, sham and mocker, he could ask that in reverence and sincerity—God's blessing upon Valérie—because he loved her. “God keep you, Valérie,” he said, and fought the tremor from his voice. “God keep you, Valérie—and bless you—and guard you through all your life.” She rose from her knees, and turning quickly because her cheeks were wet, picked up the lamp, and walked to the door. At the threshold she paused, but did not look back. “Good-night, father,” she said simply. “Good-night, Valérie,” he answered. It was dark again in the room. He had risen from his chair as Valérie had risen from her knees—and now his hand felt out for the chair again, and he sank down, and, as when she had come to him, his head was buried again in his arms upon the desk. Valérie cared! Valérie loved him! Valérie, too, had been through her hour of torment. “Not as a man—as a priest, a priest of God.” No, he would not believe that, he would not let himself believe that. It could not be so! She was troubled, in distress—about something else. What time was it now? Not daylight yet—the merciful daylight—no sign of daylight yet? If it were true—what then? If she cared—what then? If Valérie loved him—what then? What was he to do in the “afterwards”? It would not be himself alone who was to bear the burden then. It was not true, of course; he would not believe it, he would not let himself believe it. But if it were true how would Valérie endure the hanging by the neck until he was dead of the man she loved, or the knowledge of what he was, or the death by accident—of the man she loved! He did not stir now. He made no sound, no movement—and his head lay in his outflung arms. And time passed, and through the window crept the gray of dawn—and presently it was daylight—the merciful daylight—and the night was gone. But he was scarcely conscious of it now. It grew lighter still, and filled the room—that merciful daylight. And his brain, sick and stumbling and weary, reeled on and on, and there was the dream of the Walled Place again, and Valérie was closing the gate that was studded with iron spikes—and there was no way out. And then very slowly, like a man rousing from a stupor, his head came up from the desk, and he listened. From across the green came the sound of the church bells ringing for early mass. And as he listened the bells seemed to catch up the tempo of some refrain. What was it? Yes, he knew now. It was the opening of the mass—the words he would have to go in there presently and say. Were they mocking him, those bells! Was this what the daylight, the merciful daylight had brought—only a crowning, pitiless, merciless jeer! His face, strained and haggard, lifted suddenly a little higher. Was it only mockery, or could it be—see, they seemed to peal more softly now—could it be that they held another meaning—like voices calling in compassion to him because he was lost? No—his mind was dazed—it could not mean that—for him. But listen! They were repeating it over and over again. It was the call to mass, for it was daylight, and the beginning of a new day. Listen! “ Introibo ad altare Dei —I will go in unto the Altar of God.” CHAPTER XIX—THE TWO SINNERS I NTROIBO ad altare Dei—I will go in unto the Altar of God.” It had been days, another week of them, since the morning when he had raised his head to that call for early mass,' and his brain, stumbling and confused, had set those words in a refrain to the tempo of the pealing bells. It was midnight now—another night—the dreaded night. They were not all like that other night, not all so pitiless—that would have been beyond physical endurance. But they were bad, all the nights were bad. They seemed cunningly just to skirt the border edge of strain that could be endured, and cunningly just to evade the breaking point. It was midnight. On the table beside the bed stood the lighted lamp; and beside the lamp, topped by a prayer-book, was a little pile of François Aubert's books; and the bed was turned neatly down, disclosing invitingly the cool, fresh sheets. These were Madame Lafleur's kindly and well-meant offices. Madame La-fleur knew that he did not sleep very well. Each evening she came in here and set the lamp on the table, and arranged the books, and turned down the bed. This was the same rocking-chair he sat in now that he had sat in night after night, and watched a man with bandaged head lying on that same bed—watched and waited for the man to die. The man was not there any more—there were just the cool, fresh sheets. The man was in Tournayville. He had seen the man again that afternoon—and now it was the man who was waiting to die. “I will go in unto the Altar of God.” With a curious hesitancy he reached out and took the prayer-book from the table, and abstractedly began to finger its pages. What did those words mean? They had been with him incessantly, insistently, since that morning when he had groped for their meaning as between the bitterest of mockeries and a sublime sincerity. They did not mock him now, they held no sting of irony. It was very strange. They had not mocked him all that week. He had been glad, eager, somehow, to repeat them to himself. Did they mean—peace? Peace! If he could have peace—even for to-night. If he could lie down between those cool, fresh sheets—and sleep! He was physically weary. He had made himself weary each night in the hope that weariness might bring a dreamless rest. He had thrown himself feverishly into the rôle of the Curé of St. Marleau; he had walked miles and driven miles; there was not a cottage in the parish upon whose door he had not knocked, and with whose occupants he had not shared-the personal joys and sorrows of the moment; and he had sat with the sick—with old Mother Blondin that morning, for instance, who seemed quite ill and feeble, and who in the last few days had taken to her bed. Yes, it was strange! He had done all this, too, with a certain sincerity that was not alone due to an effort to find forgetfulness during the day and weariness that would bring repose at night. He had found neither the forgetfulness nor the repose; but he had found a sort of wistful joy in the kindly acts of the good, young Father Aubert! He had found neither the forgetfulness nor the repose. He could not forget the “afterwards”—the day that must irrevocably come—unless something, some turn of fate, some unforeseen thing intervened. Something! It was a pitiful thing to cling to—a pitiful thing even for a gambler's chance! But he clung to it now more desperately, more tenaciously than ever before. It was not only his life now, it was not only the life of the condemned man in that cell—it was Valérie. He might blindfold his mental vision; he might crush back, and trample down, and smother the thought, and refuse to admit it—but in his soul he believed she cared. And if she cared, and if that “something” did not happen, and he was forced, in whatever way he finally must choose, to play the last card—there was Valérie. If she cared—there was Valérie to suffer too! If he hanged instead of that man—there was Valérie! If he confessed from a safe distance after flight—there was Valérie to endure the shame! If the good, young Father Aubert died by “accident”—there was the condemned man in the death cell to pay the penalty—and Valérie to know the grief! Choice! What choice was there? Who called this ghastly impasse a choice! He could only wait—wait and cling to that hope, which in itself, because it was so paltry a thing to lean on, but added to the horror and suspense of the hours and days that stretched between now and the “afterwards.” “Something” might happen—yes, something might happen—but nothing had happened yet—nothing yet—and his brain, day and night, would not stop mangling and tearing itself to pieces—and would not let him rest—and there was no peace—none—not even for a few short hours. His fingers were still mechanically turning the pages of the prayer-book. “I will go in unto the Altar of God.” Why did those words keep on running insistently through his mind? Did they suggest—peace? Well, if they did, why wasn't there something practical about them, something tangible, something he could lay material hands upon, and sense, and feel? The Altar, of God! Was there in very reality a God? He had chosen once to deny it contemptuously; and he had chosen once to despise religion as cant and chicanery cleverly practised upon the gullible and the weak-minded to the profit of those who pretended to interpret it! But there were beautiful words here in this book; and religion, if this were religion, must therefore be beautiful too—if one could believe. He remembered those words at the burial of Théophile Blondin—years, an eternity ago that was—“I am the resurrection and the life... he that believeth in Me... shall never die.” He had repeated them over and over to himself that morning—he had spoken them aloud, in what had seemed then an unaccountable sincerity, to old Mother Blondin as she had clung to the palings of the cemetery fence that morning. Yes, they were beautiful words—if one could believe. And here were others! What were these words here? He was staring at an open page before him, staring and staring at it. What were these other words here? It was not that he had never seen them before—but why was the book open at this place now—at these last few words of the Benedictus? “Per viscera misericordiæ Dei nostri... illuminare his qui in tenebris et in umbra mortis sedent: ad dirigendos pedes nostros in viam pacis —Through the tender mercy of our God... to enlighten those who sit in darkness and in the shade of death: to direct our feet into the way of peace.” Were they but words—mere words—these? They were addressed to him—definitely to him, were they not? He sat in darkness, in an agony of darkness, lost, unable to find his way, and he sat—in the shade of death! Was there a God, a God who had tender mercy, a God—to direct his feet into the way of peace? The book slipped from his fingers, and dropped to the floor—and, his lips compressed, he stood up from the chair. If there was a God who had mercy, mercy of any kind—it was mercy he asked now. Where was this mercy? Where was this way of peace? Where was—a strange, bewildered, incredulous wonder was creeping into his face. Was that it—the Altar of God? Was that where there was peace—in unto the Altar of God? He had asked for a practical application of the words. Is that what they meant—that he should actually go—in unto the Altar of God—in there in the church—now? It seemed to stagger him for a moment. Numbly he stooped and picked up the prayer-book, and closed it, and laid it back on the table—and stood irresolute. Something, he was conscious, was impelling him to go there. Well, why not? If there was a God, if there was a God who had tender mercy, if it was that God whose words were suggesting a way of peace—why not put that God to the test! Once, on the afternoon just before he had attempted that man's escape, he had yielded to a previous impulse, and had gone into the church. It had been quiet, still and restful, he remembered; and he remembered that he had come away strangely calmed. But since then a cataclysm had swept over him; then he had been in a state of mind that, compared with now, was one even of peace—but even so, it was quiet, still and restful there, he remembered. He was crossing the room slowly, hesitantly, toward the door. Well, why not? If there was a God, and this impulse emanated from God—why not put it to the test? If it was all a hollow fraud, a myth, a superstition to which he was weak enough to yield, he would at least be no worse off than to sit here in that chair, or to lie upon the bed and toss the hours away until morning came! Well, he would go! He stepped softly out into the hall, closed his door behind him, groped his way in the darkness to the front door of the presbytère , opened it—and stood still for an instant, listening. Neither Valérie nor her mother, asleep upstairs, had been disturbed he was sure. If they had—well, they would assign no ulterior motive to his going out—it was only that Monsieur le Curé, poor man, did not sleep well! He closed the door quietly, and went down the steps—and at the bottom paused again. He became suddenly conscious that there was a great quiet and a great serenity in the night—and a great beauty. There were stars, a myriad stars in a perfect sky; and the moonlight bathed the church green in a radiance that made of it a velvet carpet, marvellously wrought in shadows of many hues. There, along the road, a whitewashed cottage stood out distinctly, and still further along another, and yet another—like little fortresses whose tranquillity was impregnable. And the moonlight, and the lullaby of the lapping water on the shore, and the night sounds that were the chirping of the little grass-things, were like some benediction breathed softly upon the earth. “To direct our feet into the way of peace”—Raymond murmured the words with a sudden overpowering sense of yearning and wistfulness sweeping upon him. And then, as suddenly, he was tense, alert, straining his eyes toward the front of the church. Was that a shadow there that moved, cast perhaps by the swaying branch of some tree? It was a very curious branch if that were so! The shadow seemed to have appeared suddenly from around the corner of the church and to be creeping toward the door. It was too far across the green to see distinctly, even with the moonlight as bright as it was, but it seemed as though he could see the church door open and close again—and now the shadow had disappeared. Mechanically Raymond rubbed his eyes. It was strange, so very strange that it must surely be only a trick of the imagination. The moonlight was always deceptive and lent itself easily to hallucinations, and at that distance he certainly could not be sure. And besides, at this hour, after midnight, why should any one go stealing into the church? And yet he could have sworn he had seen the door open! And stare as he would now, the shadow that had crept along the low platform above the church steps was no longer visible. He hesitated a moment. It was even an added incentive for him to go into the church, but suppose some one was there, and he should be seen? He smiled a little wanly—and stepped forward across the green. Well, what of it! Was he not the Curé of St. Mar-leau? It would be only another halo for the head of the good, young Father Aubert! It would require but a word of explanation from him, he could even tell the truth—and they would call him the devout , good, young Father Aubert! Only, instead of entering by one of the main doors, he would go in through the sacristy. He was not even likely to be seen himself in that way; and, if there was any one there, he should be able to discover who it was, and what he or she was doing there. He passed on along the side of the church, his footsteps soundless on the sward, reached the door of the sacristy, opened it silently, and stepped inside. It was intensely dark here. Treading on tiptoe, he traversed the little room, and finally, after a moment's groping, his fingers closed on the knob of the door that opened on the interior of the church. A sound broke the stillness. Yes, there was some one out there! Raymond cautiously pulled the door ajar. Came that sound again. It was very loud—and yet it was only the creak of a footstep that seemed to come from somewhere amongst the aisles. It echoed back from the high vaulted roof with a great noise. It seemed to give pause, to terrify with its own alarm whoever was out there, for now as he listened there was silence again. Still cautiously and still a little wider, Raymond opened the door, and now he could see out into the body of the church—and for a moment, as though gazing upon some mystic scene, he stood there wrapt, immovable. Above the tops of the high, stained windows, it was as though a vast canopy of impenetrable blackness were spread from end to end of the edifice; and slanting from the edge of this canopy in a series of parallel rays the moonlight, coloured into curious solemn tints, filtered across from one wall to the other. And the aisles were like little dark alleyways leading away as into some immensity beyond. And here, looming up, a statue, the figure of some white-robed saint, drew, as it were, a holy light about it, and seemed to take on life and breathe into the stillness a sense of calm and pure and unchanging presence. And the black canopy and the little dark alleyways seemed to whisper of hidden things that kept ward over this abode of God. And there was no sound—and there was awe and solemnity in this silence. And on the altar, very near him, the Altar of God that he had come to seek, the single altar light burned like a tiny scintillating jewel in its setting of moon rays. And there, shadowy against the wall, just outside the chancel rail, was the great cross. There seemed something that spoke of the immutable in that. The first little wooden church above whose doors it had been reared was gone, and there was a church of stone now with a golden, metal cross upon its spire, but this great cross of wood was still here. It was a very precious relic to St. Marleau, and so it hung there on the wall of the new church between the two windows nearest the altar. And then his eyes, travelling down the length of the cross, fixed upon its base—and the spell that had held him was gone. It was blacker there, very much blacker! There was a patch of blackness there that seemed to move and waver slightly—and it was neither shadow, nor yet the support built out to hold the base of the cross. Some one was crouching there. Well, what should he do? Remain in hiding here, or go out there as the Curé of St. Marleau and see who it was? Something urged him to go; caution bade him remain where he was. He knew a sudden resentment. He had put God to the test—and, instead of peace, he had found a prowler in the church! Ah—what was that! That low, broken sound—like a sob! Yes, it came again—and the echoes whispered it back from everywhere. It was a woman. A woman was sobbing there at the foot of the cross. Who was it? Came a thought that stabbed with pain. Not Valérie! It could not be Valérie—kneeling there under a load that was beyond her strength! It could not be Valérie in anguish and grief greater than she could bear because—because she loved a man whom she believed to be a priest of God! No—not Valérie! But if it were! He drew back a little. If it were Valérie she should not know that he had seen. At least he could save her that. He would wait until whoever it was had left the church, and if it were Valérie she would go back to the presbytère , and in that way he would know. And now—what were those words now? She was praying out there as she sobbed. And slowly an amazed and incredulous wonder spread over Raymond's face. No, it was not Valérie! That was not Valérie's voice! Those mumbling, hesitant, uncertain words, as though the memory were pitifully at fault, were not Valérie's. It was not Valérie! He recognised the voice now. It was the old woman on the hill—old Mother Blondin! And Raymond stared for a moment helplessly out through the crack of the sacristy door which he held ajar, out into those curiously tinted moon rays, and past the altar with its tiny light, to where that dark shadow lay against the wall. Old Mother Blondin! Old Mother Blondin, the heretic, was out there— praying in the church! Why? What had brought her there? Old Mother Blondin who was supposed to be ill in her bed—he had seen her there that morning! She had been sick for the last few days, and worse if anything that morning—and now—now she was here—praying in the church. What had brought her here? What motive had brought this about, that, with its strength of purpose, must have supplied physical strength as well, for she must almost literally have had to crawl down the hill in her feeble state? Had she too come seeking for—peace! Was it coincidence that they two, who had reached the lees and dregs of that common cup, should be here together, at this strange hour, at the Altar of God! Was it only coincidence—nothing more? Was he ready to believe, would he admit so much, that it was more than—coincidence? A sense of solemnity and of awe that mingled with a sense of profound compassion for old Mother Blon-din sobbing there in her misery took possession of him, and he seemed moved now as by an impulse beyond and outside himself—to go to her—to comfort and soothe her, if he could. And slowly he opened the sacristy door, and stepped out into the chancel, and into the moonlight that fell softly across the altar's edge—and he called her name. There was a cry, wild, unrestrained—a cry of terror that seemed to swirl about the church, and from the black canopy above that hid the vaulted roof was hurled back in a thousand echoes. But with the cry, as the dark form from against the wall sprang erect, Raymond caught a sharp, ominous cracking sound—and, as he looked, high up on the wall, the arms of the huge cross seemed to waver and begin to tilt forward. With a bound, as he saw her danger, Raymond cleared the chancel rail, and the next instant had caught at the base of the cross and steadied it. In her terror as she had jumped to her feet, she had knocked against it and forced it almost off the sort of shelf, or ledge, that had been built out from the wall to support it; and at the same time, he could see now, one or more of the wall fastenings at the top had given away. It was very heavy and unmanageable, but he finally succeeded in getting it far enough back into position to make it temporarily secure. He turned then to face Mother Blondin. She seemed oblivious, unconscious of her escape, though her face in the moonlight held a ghastly colour. She was staring at him with eyes that burned feverishly in their deep sockets. She was not crying now, but there were still tears, undried, that clung to her withered cheeks. One bony hand reached out and clutched at the back of a pew, for she was swaying on her feet; but the other was clenched and knotted—and suddenly she raised it and shook it in his face. “Yes, it is I! I—Mother Blondin!” she choked. “Mother Blondin—the old hag—the excommuniée! You saw me come in—eh? And you have come to put me out—to put old Mother Blondin, the excommuniée , out—eh? I have no right here—here—eh? Well, who said I had any right! Put me out—put me out—put me——-” The clenched hand opened, clawed queerly at her face, as though to clear away something that had gathered before her eyes and would not let her see—and she reeled heavily backward. Raymond's arm went around her shoulders. “You are ill, Madame Blondin—ill and weak,” he said soothingly. “See”—he half lifted, half supported her into the pew—“sit down here for a moment and rest. I am afraid I frightened you. I am very sorry. Perhaps it would have been better if I had left you by yourself; but I heard you sobbing out here, and I thought that I might perhaps help you—and so I came—and so—you are better now, are you not?—-and so, you see, it was not to drive you out of the church.” She looked at him in a sort of angry unbelief. “Ah!” she exclaimed fiercely. “Why do you tell me that, eh? Why do you tell me that? I have no right here—and you are a priest. That is your business—to drive me out.” “No,” said Raymond gravely; “it is not my business. And I think you would go very far, Madame Blondin, before you would find a priest who would drive you from his church under the circumstances in which I have found you here to-night.” “Well then, I will go myself!” she said defiantly—and made as though to rise. “No, not yet”—Raymond pressed her quietly back into the seat. “You must rest for a little while. Why, this morning, you know, you were seriously ill in bed. Surely you were not alone in the house to-night, that there was no one to prevent you getting up—I asked Madame Bouchard to——” “Madame Bouchard came to spend the night, but I did not want her, and I sent her home,” she interrupted brusquely. “You should not have done that, Madame Blondin,” Raymond remonstrated kindly. “But even then, you are very weak, and I do not see how you managed to get here.” Her face set hard with the old stubborn indomitableness that he knew so well. “I walked!” she said shortly. Her hands were twisting together in her lap. There was dust covering her skirt thickly. “And fell,” he said. She did not answer. “Will you tell me why you came?” he asked. “Because I was a fool”—her lips were working, her hands kept twisting over each other in her lap. “I heard you praying,” said Raymond gently. “What brought you here to-night, Madame Blondin?” She shook her head now, and turned her face away. The moonlight fell on the sparse, gray hair, and the thin, drooping shoulders, and the unkempt, shabby clothing. It seemed to enfold her in an infinite sympathy all its own. And suddenly Raymond found that his eyes were wet. It did not seem so startling and incongruous a thing that she should be here at midnight in the church—at the Altar of God. And yet—and yet why had she come? Something within himself demanded in a strange wistfulness the answer to that question, as though in the answer she would answer for them both, for the two who had no right here in this sacred place unless—unless, if there were a God, that God in His own way had meant to—direct their feet into the way of peace. “Madame Blondin”—his voice was very low, trembling with earnestness—“Madame Blondin, do you believe in God?” Her hands stopped their nervous movements, and clasped hard one upon the other. “No!” she cried out sharply. “No—I——” And then her voice faltered, and she burst suddenly into tears. “I—I don't know.” His arm was still about her shoulders, and now his hand tightened a little upon her. She was crying softly. He was silent now—staring before him at that tiny flame burning in the moon rays on the altar. Well, suppose she did! Suppose even Mother Blondin believed, though she would fight on until she was beaten to her knees before she would unconditionally admit it, did that mean anything to him? Mother Blondin had not stood before that altar there with a crucifix upon her breast, and—— She was speaking again—brushing the tears away with the back of her hand. “Once I did—once I believed,” she said. “That was when I was a girl, and—and for a little while afterward. I used to come to the church then, and I used to believe. And then after Pierre died I married Blondin, and after that very soon I came no more. It is forty years—forty years—it was the old church then. The ban came before this one was built—I was never in here before—it is only the old cross there, the cross that was on the old church, that I know. Forty years is a long time—a long time—I am seventy-two now—seventy-two.” She was crying again softly. “Yes,” said Raymond, and his own voice choked, “and to-night—after forty years?” “I wanted to come”—she seemed almost to be whispering to herself—“I wanted to come. Blondin said there was no God, but I remembered that when I was a girl—forty years ago—there was a God here. I—I wanted to come and see—and—and I—I don't know—I—I couldn't remember the prayers very well, and so maybe if God is still here He did not understand. Pierre always said there was a God, and he used to come here with me to mass; but Blondin said the priests were all liars, and I began to drink with Blondin, and he said they were all liars when he died, and no one except the ones that came to buy the whiskey-blanc would have anything to do with us, and—and I believed him.” “And Pierre?” Raymond asked softly. “Who was Pierre?”

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