Page:Dellada - The Woman and the Priest, 1922.djvu/140

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THE WOMAN AND THE PRIEST

eyes were full of tears. Then, overcome by an irresistible emotion, the boy knelt down beside the widow, but still keeping his arm stretched out to touch the book. And he thought to himself:

"Surely he is the best man in all the world, for he weeps when he reads the word of God!" And he did not venture to raise his eyes again to look at Paul, but with his free hand he pulled the little girl's skirt to keep her quiet, though not without a secret fear that the demons who were being exorcised from her body would enter into his own.

The possessed child had ceased throwing herself about and stood up straight and stiff, her thin brown neck stretched to its full length, her little chin stuck forward over the knot of her kerchief and her eyes fixed upon the priest's face. Gradually her expression changed, her mouth relaxed and opened, and it seemed as if the words of the Gospel, the murmuring of the wind and the rustle of the trees on the ridge were working upon her as a charm. Suddenly she tore her skirt from Antiochus's restraining

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