tables from the room. The Abby passed through the
door into the open air, and the Cure and the Seigneur went arm in arm
together, talking earnestly. The Cure turned in the doorway.

"Courage, Monsieur!" he said to Charley, and bowed himself out. Jo
Portugais followed.

One officer took his place at the front door and the other at the back
door, outside.

The Abby, by himself, took to walking backward and forward under the
trees, buried in gloomy reflection. Jo Portugais caught his sleeve.

"Come with me for a moment, M'sieu'," he said. "It is important."

The Abby followed him.

CHAPTER XXXII. JO PORTUGAIS TELLS A STORY

Jo Portugais had fastened down a secret with clasps heavier than iron,
and had long stood guard over it. But life is a wheel, and natures move
in circles, passing the same points again and again, the points being
distant or near to the sense as the courses of life have influenced
the nature. Confession was an old principle, a light in the way, a
rest-house for Jo and all his race, by inheritance, by disposition, and
by practice. Again and again Jo had come round to the rest-house
since one direful day, but had not, found his way therein. There were
passwords to give at the door, there was the tale of the journey to tell
to the door-keeper. And this tale he had not been ready to tell. But the
man who knew of the terrible thing he had done, who had saved him from
the consequences of that terrible thing, was in sore trouble, and this
broke down the gloomy guard he had kept over his dread secret. He fought
the matter out with himself, and, the battle ended, he touched the
door-keeper on the arm, beckoned him to a lonely place in the trees, and
knelt down before him.

"What is it you seek?" asked the door-keeper, whose face was set and
forbidding.

"To find peace," answered the man; yet he was thinking more of another's
peril than of his own soul. "What have I to do with the peace of your
soul? Yonder is your shepherd and keeper," said the doorkeeper, pointing
to where two men walked arm in arm under the trees.

"Shall the sinner not choose the keeper of his sins?" said the man
huskily.

"Who has been the keeper all these years? Who has given you peace?"

"I have had no keeper; I have had no peace these many years."

"How many years?" The Abbe's voice was low and even, and showed no
feeling, but his eyes were keenly inquiring and intent.

"Seven years."

"Is the sin that held you bac