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 touched his food, but Father Joseph ate generously, as he was apt to do when fired by a new project.

After Fructosa had brought the coffee, he leaned back in his chair and turned to his friend with a beaming face. “I often think, Jean, how you were an unconscious agent in the hands of Providence when you recalled me from Tucson. I seemed to be doing the most important work of my life there, and you recalled me for no reason at all, apparently. You did not know why, and I did not know why. We were both acting in the dark. But Heaven knew what was happening at Cripple Creek, and moved us like chessmen on the board. When the call came, I was here to answer it—by a miracle, indeed.”

Father Latour put down his silver coffee-cup. “Miracles are all very well, Joseph, but I see none here. I sent for you because I felt the need of your companionship. I used my authority as a Bishop to gratify my personal wish. That was selfish, if you will, but surely natural enough. We are countrymen, and are bound by early memories. And that two friends, having come together, should part and go their separate ways—that is natural, too. No, I don’t think we need any miracle to explain all this.”

Father Vaillant had been wholly absorbed in his preparations for saving souls in the gold camps—blind to everything else. Now it came over him in a flash, how the Bishop had held himself aloof from his