"I think I am mad to-day, Bawn," she went on: "and if I do not speak to some one I shall surely go mad. I wish I were a Roman Catholic and could confess to a priest. How much wiser they are than those who deny the necessity of confession! I have always been fond of you, Bawn. I believe you are as true as steel. Let me confess to you and save my reason."
"No, no," I said; "you are not yourself to-day. You will be sorry afterwards. There is Sir Arthur."
"If you will not listen to me I shall go to him, and there will be an end to everything. Perhaps I am mad. It's enough to drive any woman mad. Richard Dawson is dying; and my little Robin is sickening. They will not let me be with him till they know if it is the small-pox. Isn't it enough to drive a woman mad?"
"Tell me, you poor soul," I said—"tell me everything. Afterwards it will be buried at the bottom of the sea."
She turned to me with a sick look of gratitude.
"You don't know how it will ease me," she said. "I had a thought of going to Quinn by the light railway and going into the Catholic Chapel there and finding a priest who would listen to me and absolve me. But I was afraid I should be seen and recognized. When they told me Robin was sickening I knew it was a judgment of God."
"God doesn't judge in that way," I said. "Perhaps it is in that way He calls you back. I have no belief in an angry God!"
"You have not, Bawn? I was brought up on it. It turned me away from religion. You think God will not take the child away from me because of my sin?"
The anguished soul in her eyes implored me. God forgive me if it was presumptuous, but I said—