An impetuous desire to act, to
battle with his fate, seized him. He stopped upon his heel, and smote
his palms together triumphantly. His wife was--where? But there
was a tangible link; an outlet more or less navigable, through which
his derelict ship of matrimony might yet be safely towed--the
priest!
Like all imaginative men with pliable natures, Lorison was, when
thoroughly stirred, apt to become tempestuous. With a high and
stubborn indignation upon him, be retraced his steps to the
intersecting street by which he had come. Down this he hurried to the
corner where he had parted with--an astringent grimace tinctured the
thought--his wife. Thence still back he harked, following through
an unfamiliar district his stimulated recollections of the way they
had come from that preposterous wedding. Many times he went abroad,
and nosed his way back to the trail, furious.
At last, when he reached the dark, calamitous building in which his
madness had culminated, and found the black hallway, he dashed down
it, perceiving no light or sound. But he raised his voice, hailing
loudly; reckless of everything but that he should find the old
mischief-maker with the eyes that looked too far away to see the
disaster he had wrought. The door opened, and in the stream of light
Father Rogan stood, his book in hand, with his finger marking the
place.
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