She sat as motionless as stone, yet wore a look of apprehension, and in the small, restless black eyes which peered out from the pinched and wasted face, betrayed the peacelessness of a harrowed mind; and neither the recollection of bride, nor of groom, nor of potential friends behind, nor the occupation of the present hour, could shut out from the tired priest the image of that woman, or the sound of his own low words of invitation to her, given as the company left the church--"Come to confession this afternoon." By and by a long time passed without the approach of any step, or any glancing of light or shadow, save for the occasional progress from station to station of some one over on the right who was noiselessly going the way of the cross.

Yet Pere Jerome tarried.
"She will surely come," he said to himself; "she promised she would come." A moment later, his sense, quickened by the prolonged silence, caught a subtle evidence or two of approach, and the next moment a penitent knelt noiselessly at the window of his box, and the whisper came tremblingly, in the voice he had waited to hear: "_Benissez-moin, mo' Pere, pa'ce que mo peche_." (Bless me, father, for I have sinned.) He gave his blessing.
"_Ainsi soit-il_--Amen," murmured the penitent, and then, in the soft accents of the Creole _patois_, continued: "'I confess to Almighty God, to the blessed Mary, ever Virgin, to blessed Michael the Archangel, to blessed John the Baptist, to the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and to all the saints, that I have sinned exceedingly in thought, word, and deed, _through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault_.' I confessed on Saturday, three weeks ago, and received absolution, and I have performed the penance enjoined.

Since then----" There she stopped.
There was a soft stir, as if she sank slowly down, and another as if she rose up again, and in a moment she said: "Olive _is_ my child.

The picture I showed to Jean Thompson is the half-sister of my daughter's father, dead before my child was born.

She is the image of her and of him; but, O God! Thou knowest! Oh Olive, my own daughter!" She ceased, and was still.