'A man these days and nights wants to know what his women folks are up to.' Oh, yes, he had been a fool; he had looked at things from the wrong standpoint.
But the wildest note in all the clamour was struck by pain's forefinger, jealousy. Now, at least, he felt that keenest sting -- a mounting love unworthily bestowed. Whatever she might be, he loved her; he bore in his own breast his doom. A grating, comic flavour to his pre- dicament struck him suddenly, and he laughed creakingly as he swung down the echoing pavement. An impetuous desire to act, to battle with his fate, seized him. He stopped upon his heel, and smote his palms together triumphantly. His wife was -- where? But there was a tangible link; an outlet more or less navigable, through which his derelict ship of matrimony might yet be safely towed -- the priest!
Like all imaginative men with pliable natures, Lorison was, when thoroughly stirred, apt to become tempest- uous. With a high and stubborn indignation upon him, be retraced his steps to the intersecting street by which he had come. Down this he hurried to the corner where he had parted with -- an astringent grimace tinctured the thought -- his wife. Thence still back he harked, follow- ing through an unfamiliar district his stimulated recollec- tions of the way they had come from that preposterous wedding. Many times he went abroad, and nosed his way back to, the trail, furious.
At last, when he reached the dark, calamitous building in which his madness had culminated, and found the black hallway, he dashed down it, perceiving no light or sound. But he raised his voice, hailing loudly; reckless of everything but that he should find the old mischief- maker with the eyes that looked too far awav to see the disaster he had wrought. The door opened, and in the stream of light Father Rogan stood, his book in hand, with his finger marking the place.
'Ah!' cried Lorison. 'You are the man I want. I had a wife of you a few hours ago. I would not trouble you, but I neglected to note how it was done. Will you oblige me with the information whether the business is beyond remedy?'
'Come inside,' said the priest; 'there are other lodgers in the house, who might prefer sleep to even a gratified curiosity.'
Lorison entered the room and took the chair offered him. The priest's eyes looked a courteous interrogation.
'I must apologize again,' said the young man, 'for so soon intruding upon you with my marital infelicities, but, as my wife has neglected to furnish me with her address, I am deprived of the legitimate recourse of a family row.'
'I am quite a plain man,' said Father Rogan, pleas- antly; 'but I do not see how I am to ask you questions.'
'Pardon my indirectness,' said Lorison; 'I will ask one. In this room to-night you pronounced me to be a husband. You afterward spoke of additional rites or performances that either should or could be effected. I paid little attention to your words then, but I am hungry to hear them repeated now. As matters stand, am I married past all help?'
'You are as legally and as firmly bound,' said the priest, 'as though it had been done in a cathedral, in the presence of thousands. The additional observances I referred to are not necessary to the strictest legality of the act, but were advised as a precaution for the future -- for convenience of proof in such contingencies as wills, inheritances and the like.'
Lorison laughed harshly.
'Many thanks,' he said. 'Then there is no mistake, and I am the happy benedict. I suppose I should go stand upon the bridal corner, and when my wife gets through walking the streets she will look me up.'
Father Rogan regarded him calmly.
'My son,' he said, 'when a man and woman come to me to be married I always marry them. I do this for the sake of other people whom they might go away and marry if they did not marry each other. As you see, I do not seek your confidence; but your case seems to me to be one not altogether devoid of interest. Very few marriages that have come to my notice have brought such well- expressed regret within so short a time. I will hazard one question: were you not under the impression that you loved the lady you married, at the time you did so;'
'Loved her!' cried Lorison, wildly. 'Never so well as now, though she told me she deceived and sinned and stole. Never more than now, when, perhaps, she is laughing at the fool she cajoled and left, with scarcely a word, to return to God only knows what particular line of her former folly.'
Father Rooan answered nothing. During the silence that succeeded, he sat with a quiet expectation beaming in his full, lambent eye.
'If you would listen -- ' began Lorison. The priest held up his hand.
'As I hoped,' he said. 'I thought you would trust me. Wait but a moment.' He brought a long clay pipe, filled and lighted it.
'Now, my son,' he said.
Lorison poured a twelve month's accumulated con- fidence into Father Rogan's ear. He told all; not sparing himself or omitting the facts of his past, the events of the night, or his disturbing conjectures and fears.
'The main point,' said the priest, when he had con- cluded, 'seems to me to be this -- are you reasonably sure that you love this woman whom you have married?'
'Why,' exclaimed Lorisoii, rising impulsively to his feet - 'why should I deny it? But look at me -- am fish, flesh or fowl? That is the main point to me, assure you.'
'I understand you,' said the priest, also risino,, and laying down his pipe. 'The situation is one that has taxed the endurance of much older men than you -- in fact, especially much older men than you. I will try to relieve you from it, and this night. You shall see for yourself into exactly what predicament you have fallen, and how you shall, possibly, be extricated. There is no evidence so credible as that of the eyesight.'
Father Rogan moved about the room, and donned a soft black hat. Buttoning his coat to his throat, he laid his hand on the doorknob. 'Let us walk,' he said.
The two went out upon the street. The priest turned his face down it, and Lorison walked with him through a squalid district, where the houses loomed, awry and desoiate-looking, high above them. Presently they turned into a less dismal side street, where the houses were smaller, and, though hinting of the most meagre comfort,
