"And may the Blessed Mother help and protect you."
"Amen" again came the response.
They arose. It was a transfiguration. Determination and pride on Daly's face, love on Mrs. Daly's, and gladness on the boy's.
"Now, Michael, I want you to go to confession next Saturday night and receive Holy Communion on Sunday," said the priest. "You do your part, and God will do His. You have given Him no opportunity to help you these past years. You have kept away from Him, your best Friend and Helper."
"Never again," said Daly, firmly.
"Straighten up now," said the priest, "and come to see me Monday morning. I'll have a job for you by that time. Here's a few dollars to get some clothes. You can pay me back when you have it to spare. Good-bye."
For sometime after the priest went away, they spoke not a word. They could not, for something seemed to lodge in their throats. When Mrs. Daly found that she could use her voice, she went to a little box on the bureau, kept carefully in the midst of all the confusion, and taking out her rosary of the Blessed Virgin, she went over to her husband and son and said, "And now let us thank her." They knelt down, said the beads and finished with the prayer:
"Hail, holy Queen, Mother of Mercy, our life, our sweetness and our hope; to thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve; to thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. Turn then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us, and after this our exile, show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus. O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary."
There is joy even in heaven over a sinner that doth penance.
(IV)