It's true, of course. I knew he wasn't yours the moment I first saw him."

"There's not much misses you, is there?"

"I suppose not. However, it doesn't take much more than very ordinary powers of observation to see when the various members of my parish are troubled, or in pain. And having seen, it is my duty to do what I can to help."

"You're very well liked in Gilly, Father."

"For which no doubt I may thank my face and my figure," said the priest bitterly, unable to make it sound as light as he had intended. "Is that what you think? I can't agree, Father. We like you because you're a good pastor."

"Well, I seem to be thoroughly embroiled in your troubles, at any rate," said Father Ralph uncomfortably. "You'd best get it off your chest, man." Paddy stared into the fire, which he had built up to the proportions of a furnace while the priest was putting Meggie to bed, in an excess of remorse and frantic to be doing something. The empty glass in his hand shook in a series of rapid jerks; Father Ralph got up for the whiskey bottle and replenished it. After a long draft Paddy sighed, wiping the forgotten tears from his face. "I don't know who Frank's father is. It happened before I met Fee. Her people are practically New Zealand's first family socially, and her father had a big wheat-and-sheep property outside Ashburton in the South Island. Money was no object, and Fee was his only daughter. As I understand it, he'd planned her life for her-a trip to the old country, a debut at court, the right husband. She had never lifted a hand in the house, of course. They had maids and butlers and horses and big carriages; they lived like lords. "I was the dairy hand, and sometimes I used to see Fee in the distance, walking with a little boy about eighteen months old. The next thing, old James Armstrong came to see me. His daughter, he said, had disgraced the family; she wasn't married and she had a child. It hale been hushed up, of course, but when they tried to get her away her grandmother made such a fuss they had no choice but to keep her on the place, in spite of the awkwardness. Now the grandmother was dying, there was nothing to stop them getting rid of Fee and her child. I was a single man, James said; if I'd marry her and guarantee to take her out of the South Island, they'd pay our traveling expenses and an additional five hundred pounds. "Well, Father, it was a fortune to me, and I was tired of the single life. But I was always so shy I was never any good with the girls. It seemed like a good idea to me, and I honestly didn't mind the child. The grandmother got wind of it and sent for me, even though she was very ill. She was a tartar in her day, I'll bet, but a real lady.