Perhaps I'd forget Him."

"Not much fear of that," I exclaimed fervently; "but now let us
calculate the chances."

"But oh, Father, if you only knew Rex,--he is so good, so gentle, he
takes so kindly to the poor, ("the clever rascal," I ejaculated under my
breath,) and he likes us so much, I'm sure it needs but little to make
him an excellent Catholic."

Well, now, what is a poor old man to do? Here am I, prepared to
calculate and balance chances of this young man's conversion,--the
_pros_ and _cons_ of a serious matter; and here this young lady
branches off into a magnificent apotheosis of her young demigod! What
has the cold yellow candle light of reason to do in the _camera obscura_
of the human heart? Let us fling open the shutters, and let in the
golden sunshine.

"So I've heard," I said. "And I also know this, Beata, that is, I've
read something like it in good books, written by holy and thoughtful
men, that the gift of faith is given freely by the Holy Spirit to those
who, like your _fiance_, have led pure and unsullied lives."

She started at the word _fiance_, and the smile on her face was a study.
Poor old Dante! no wonder you walked on air, and lightly spurned the
stars, when your lady beckoned.

"Beatrice in suso, ed io in lei guardava."

So shall it be to the end.

Well, we talked the whole thing over; debated all possibilities, laughed
at difficulties, cut through obstacles, leaped over obstructions, and,
at last, saw in imagination, written on the cold, frosty air of
December, the mystic legend, I WILL, surrounded by a gorgeous corona of
orange blossoms.

Then, of course, the superb unreason of women. Beata began to cry as I
handed her over to Miss Leslie, who looked daggers at me, and I am quite
sure called me, in her own mind, "A horrid old thing!"

Father Letheby, after his unusually heavy confessional, was jubilant.
Nothing exhilarates him like work. Given a scanty confessional, and he
is as gloomy as Sisyphus; given a hard, laborious day, and he is as
bright as Ariel. He was in uncommonly good spirits to-day.

"By Jove, Father Dan," he said, as we walked home together to our little
bit of fish, "I have it. I'll try him with the _Kampaner Thal!_"

"The very thing," I replied.

"Don't you think it would do? You know he regards all our arguments as
so much special pleading, and he discounts them accordingly."

"Of course," I said. "Wonder you never thought of it before!"

"That