“Oh, yes,”, Theron made answer; “I shall do nothing rash.  But I have a good many plans for the future.”

Father Forbes did not ask what these were, and a brief further period of silence fell upon the table.

“I hope everything went off smoothly at the picnic,” Theron ventured, at last.  “I have not seen any of you since then.”

The priest shook his head and sighed.  “No,” he said.  “It is a bad business.  I have had a great deal of unhappiness out of it this past fortnight.  That young man who was rude to you—­of course it was mere drunken, irresponsible nonsense on his part—­has got himself into a serious scrape, I’m afraid.  It is being kept quite within the family, and we hope to manage so that it will remain there, but it has terribly upset his father and his sister.  But that, after all, is not so hard to bear as the other affliction that has come upon the Maddens.  You remember Michael, the other brother?  He seems to have taken cold that evening, or perhaps over-exerted himself.  He has been seized with quick consumption.  He will hardly last till snow flies.”

“Oh, I am grieved to hear that!” Theron spoke with tremulous earnestness.  It seemed to him as if Michael were in some way related to him.

“It is very hard upon them all,” the priest went on.  “Michael is as sweet and holy a character as it is possible for any one to think of.  He is the apple of his father’s eye.  They were inseparable, those two.  Do you know the father, Mr. Madden?”

Theron shook his head.  “I think I have seen him,” he said.  “A small man, with gray whiskers.”

“A peasant,” said Father Forbes, “but with a heart of gold.  Poor man! he has had little enough out of his riches.  Ah, the West Coast people, what tragedies I have seen among them over here!  They have rudimentary lung organizations, like a frog’s, to fit the mild, wet soft air they live in.  The sharp air here kills them off like flies in a frost.  Whole families go.  I should think there are a dozen of old Jeremiah’s children in the cemetery.  If Michael could have passed his twenty-eighth year, there would have been hope for him, at least till his thirty-fifth.  These pulmonary things seem to go by sevens, you know.”

“I didn’t know,” said Theron.  “It is very strange—­and very sad.”  His startled mind was busy, all at once, with conjectures as to Celia’s age.

“The sister—­Miss Madden—­seems extremely strong,” he remarked tentatively.

“Celia may escape the general doom,” said the priest.  His guest noted that he clenched his shapely white hand on the table as he spoke, and that his gentle, carefully modulated voice had a gritty hardness in its tone.  “That would be too dreadful to think of,” he added.

Theron shuddered in silence, and strove to shut his mind against the thought.

“She has taken Michael’s illness so deeply to heart,” the priest proceeded, “and devoted herself to him so untiringly that I get a little nervous about her.  I have been urging her to go away and get a change of air and scene, if only for a few days.  She does not sleep well, and that is always a bad thing.”