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122 "I would say to him that it is a great pity for him to let his life pass away from him abiding by a promise that has no force, when he is not bound before God to fulfil the promise."

"I can't make any guess," said the priest, "as to the answer you would get from him. He is too deep and too mysterious a man. No matter how keenly you might guess at what he would say, when the words came they would be seven miles away from your guess. But I could promise you that he would say something that you would not expect, and that would upset all your ideas."

"I don't know in the world, Father," said John, "what I had better do."

"Did Mary tell you," said the priest, "what Shiana said to her the day he went to your house?"

"No, Father," said John, "and I didn't ask her."

"Perhaps," said the priest, "if you knew what he said to her that day, it might show you enough of his mind to put you on the right road before you went to speak to him."

"Very well, Father," said John. "I will ask her about it now when I get home, though I don't like talking about it to her at all, for fear that it might trouble her, and that that depression might come upon her again."

"All you need do," said the priest, "is to touch upon the subject as quietly and as carelessly as possible."