it, and marry—­marry, and live in tranquil indifference to it.  No, I must put aside the thought of marriage, the thought of personal happiness.  I must sell all I have and give it to the poor, take up my cross and follow Him.  I am going to Rome to study for the priesthood.’  Imagine,” groaned John, stretching out his hands, “imagine talking like that to a woman you are supposed to love, to a woman who loves you.”  And he wrathfully ground his heel into the earth.

Maria Dolores looked serious.

“After all, he had to obey his conscience,” she said.  “After all, he was logical, he was consistent.”

“Oh, his conscience!  Oh, consistency!” cried John, with an intolerant fling of the body.  “At bottom it’s nothing better than common self-indulgence, as I took the liberty of telling him to his face.  It’s the ardour of the convert, acting upon that acid solution of flint which takes the place of blood in his veins, and causing sour puritanical impulses, which (like any other voluptuary) he immediately gives way to.  It’s nothing better than unbridled passion.  Conscience, indeed!  Where was his conscience when it came to her?  Think of that poor girl—­that poor pale girl—­who loved him.  Oh, Mother of Mercy!”

He moved impatiently three steps to the left, three steps to the right, beating the palm of one hand with the back of the other.

“What did she do?  How did she take it?” asked Maria Dolores.

“What she ought to have done,” said John, between his teeth, “was to scratch his eyes out.  What she did do, as he informed me with a seraphic countenance, was not merely to approve of everything he said, but to determine to do likewise.  So, while he’s on his way to Rome, to get himself tonsured and becassocked, she’s scrubbing the floors of an Ursuline convent, as a novice.  And there are two lives spoiled.”  He shrugged his shoulders.

“Oh, no, no,” contended Maria Dolores, earnestly, shaking her head, “not spoiled.  On the contrary.  It is sad, in a way, if you like, but it is very beautiful, it is heroic.  Their love must have been a very beautiful love, that could lead them to such self-sacrifice.  Two lives given to God.”

“Can’t people give their lives to God without ceasing to live?” cried John.  “If marriage is a sacrament, how can they better give their lives to God than by living sanely and sweetly in Christian marriage?  But these people withdraw from life, renounce life, shirk and evade the life that God had prepared for them and was demanding of them.  It’s as bad as suicide.  Besides, it implies such a totally perverted view of religion.  Religion surely is given to us to help us to live, to show us how to live, to enable us to meet the difficulties, emergencies, responsibilities of life.  But these people look upon their religion as a mandate to turn their backs on the responsibilities of life, and scuttle away.  And as for love!  Well, she no doubt did love, poor lady.  But Winthorpe!  No.  When a man loves he doesn’t send his love into a convent, and go to Rome to get himself becassocked.”  He gave his head a nod of finality.