few minutes."

Mark sat down again and thought. The priest had said nothing about the
lady of the tree, and Mark really wanted him to mention her; but Father
Murray had given him something else that made him thoughtful and
brought back memories. Mark did not have long to wait, for the door
opened in five minutes and the priest came out alone.

"Mrs. O'Leary came to arrange for the funeral herself--brave, wasn't
it?" he said. "I left her with Ann, my housekeeper, a good soul whose
specialty is one in which the Irish excel--sympathy. Ann keeps it in
stock and, though she is eternally drawing on it, the stock never
diminishes. Mrs. O'Leary's troubles are even now growing less."

"Sympathy and loyalty," said Mark, "are chief virtues of the Irish I
knew at home."

"Ann has both," said Father Murray, hunting for his pipe. "But the
latter to an embarrassing degree. She would even run the parish if she
could, to see that it was run to save me labor. Ann has been a
priest's housekeeper for twenty-five years. She has condoled with
hundreds; she loves the poor but has no patience with shams. We have a
chronic sick man here who is her particular _bête noir_. And, as for
organists, she would cheerfully drown them all. But Mrs. O'Leary is
safe with Ann."

"Poor woman!" said Mark.

"That reminds me," said Father Murray. "I had a convert priest here a
little while ago. His Bishop had sent him for his initial 'breaking