6/32 But he had done just that. He no longer doubted this last immeasurable fact. Twenty times since then, coldly and critically, he had thought of the woman who had been his wife, and slowly and terribly the enormity of her crime had swept further and further away from him the anguish of her loss. He was like a man risen from a sick bed, breathing freely again, tasting once more the flavour of the air that filled his lungs. All this he owed to Father Roland, and because of this--and his confession of only two nights ago--he felt a burning humiliation at the thought of telling the Missioner that another face had come to fill his thoughts, and stir his anxieties. |