of the smallpox epidemic, and who knew what lay beneath the outer gaiety.
She had been buoyant of spirit beside the beds of the sick, and her words
were full of raillery and humour, yet there was ever a gentle note behind
all; and the priest had seen her eyes shining with tears, as she bent
over some stricken sufferer bound upon an interminable journey.

"Bedad! as bright a little spark as ever struck off the steel," added
Finden to the priest, with a sidelong, inquisitive look, "but a heart no
bigger than a marrowfat pea-selfishness, all self. Keepin' herself for
herself when there's manny a good man needin' her. Mother o' Moses, how
manny! From Terry O'Ryan, brother of a peer, at Latouche, to Bernard
Bapty, son of a millionaire, at Vancouver, there's a string o' them. All
pride and self; and as fair a lot they've been as ever entered for the
Marriage Cup. Now, isn't that so, father?"

Finden's brogue did not come from a plebeian origin. It was part of his
commercial equipment, an asset of his boyhood spent among the peasants on
the family estate in Galway.

Father Bourassa fanned himself with the black broadbrim hat he wore, and
looked benignly but quizzically on the wiry, sharp-faced Irishman.

"You t'ink her heart is leetla. But perhaps it is your mind not so big
enough to see--hein?" The priest laughed noiselessly, showing white
teeth. "Was it so selfish in Madame to refuse the name of Finden--
n'est-ce pas?"

Finden flushed, then burst into a laugh. "I'd almost forgotten I was one
of them--the first almost. Blessed be he that expects nothing, for he'll
get it, sure. It was my duty, and I did it. Was she to feel that Jansen