I was so startled and shocked by his fierce assault, and by the cruel climax it had come to, that I flung up my hands to my face and kept them there, for I felt as if my brain had been stunned and my heart was bursting.

How long I sat like this, with my hidden face to the fire, I do not know; but after a long silence in which I heard nothing but my own heaving breath, I became aware that Father Dan had drawn one of my hands down to his knee and was smoothing it with his own.

“Don’t be angry with your old priest for telling you the truth,” he said.  “It’s hard to bear; I know it’s hard; but it’s as hard for him as for you, my child.  Think—­only think what he is trying to save you from.  If you do what you wish to do, you will put yourself out of communion.  If you put yourself out of communion, you will cease to be a Catholic.  What will become of you then, my daughter?  What will be left to replace the consolations of the Church—­in sorrow, in suffering, in the hour of death?  Have you never thought of that?”

I never had.  It was thrilling through and through me.

“You say you cannot live any longer with your husband because he has broken the vow he made to you at your marriage.  But think how many many thousands of poor women all the world over are doing it every day—­living with adulterous husbands for the sake of their homes and children.  And not for the sake of their homes and children only, but for the sake of their souls and their religion.  Blessed, blessed martyrs, though we know nothing about them, holding society and the Church and the human family together.”

I was trembling all over.  I felt as if Father Dan were trying to take away from me the only sweet and precious thing in my life that was left.

“Then you think you cannot live without the one you love, because all your heart is full of him.  But think of the holy women, the holy saints, who have gone through the same temptation—­fighting against it with all the strength of their souls until the very wounds of our blessed Lord have been marked on their bodies.”

He was creeping closer to my side.  His voice was quivering at my ear.  I was struggling hard, and still trembling all over.

“Hold fast by the Church, my child.  It is your only refuge.  Remember that God made your marriage and you cannot break it without forsaking your faith.  Can anything be good that is bought at such a price?  Nothing in this world!  When you meet to-morrow night—­you two children—­tell him that.  Tell him I told you to say so. . . .  I love you both.  Don’t break your old priest’s heart.  He’s in trouble enough for you already.  Don’t let him think that he must lose you altogether.  And then remember your mother, too—­that saint in heaven who suffered so long and was patient . . .  Everything will depend upon you, my child.  In matters of this kind the woman is the stronger vessel.  Be strong for him also.  Renounce your guilty love, my daughter—­”