sses of the Catholic
religion,--so humane, so gentle with the hand that descends to man,
showing him the law of higher spheres; so awful, so divine, with that
other hand held out to lead him into heaven.

Denise had now significantly shown the rector the spot by which to
strike that rock and make the waters of repentance flow. But suddenly,
as though the memories evoked were dragging him backwards, Jean-Francois
gave the harrowing cry of the hyena when the hunters overtake it.

"No, no!" he cried, falling on his knees, "I will live! Mother, give me
your clothes; I can escape! Mercy, mercy! Go see the king; tell him--"

He stopped, gave a horrible roar, and clung convulsively to the rector's
cassock.

"Go," said Monsieur Bonnet, in a low voice, to the agitated women.

Jean heard the words; he raised his head, gazed at his mother and
sister, then he stopped and kissed their feet.

"Let us say farewell now; do not come back; leave me alone with Monsieur
Bonnet. You need not be uneasy about me any longer," he said, pressing
his mother and his sister to him with a strength in which he seemed to
put all his life.

"How is it we do not die of this?" said Denise to her mother as they
passed through the wicket.

It was nearly eight o'clock when this parting took place. At the gate of
the prison the two women met the Abbe de Rastignac, who asked them news
of the prisoner.

"He will no doubt be reconciled with God," said Denise. "If repentance
has not yet begun, he is very near it."

The bishop was soon after informed that the clergy would triumph on this
occasion, and that the criminal would go to the scaffold with the
most edifying religious sentiments. The prelate, with whom was the
attorney-general, expressed a wish to see the rector. Monsieur Bonnet
did not reach the palace before midnight. The Abbe Gabriel, who made
many trips between the palace and the jail, judged it necessary to fetch
the rector in the episcopal coach; for the poor priest was in a state of
exhaustion which almost deprived him of the use of his legs. The effect
of his day, the prospect of the morrow, the sight of the secret struggle
he had witnessed, and the full repentance which had at last overtaken
his stubborn lamb when the great reckoning of eternity was brought home
to him,--all these things had combined to break down Monsieur Bonnet,
whose nervous, electrical nature entered into the sufferings of others
as though they were his own. Souls