And then James talked, but he did not seem to know very well what he was saying, and his father told him to stop--that Peter was going where God had called him. "And you will tell her," Peter said, getting up, "that I have gone." "I haven't the heart for telling her such a thing. She will be finding it out soon enough." Outside the house--for he was sleeping at Father Tom's that night--Peter thought there was little luck in James's eyes; inside the house Pat Phelan and James thought that Peter was settled for life. "He will be a fine man standing on an altar," James said, "and perhaps he will be a bishop some day." "And you'll see her when you're done reaping, and you won't forget what Peter told you," said Pat Phelan. And, after reaping, James put on his coat and walked up the hillside, where he thought he would find Catherine. "I hear Peter has left you," she said, as he opened the gate to let the cows through. "He came last night to bid us good-bye." And they followed the cows under the tall hedges. "I shall be reaping to-morrow," he said. "I will see you at the same time." And henceforth he was always at hand to help her to drive her cows home; and every night, as he sat with his father by the fire, Pat Phelan expected James to tell him about Catherine. One evening he came back overcome, looking so wretched that his father could see that Catherine had told him she would not marry him. "She won't have me," he said. "A man can always get a girl if he tries long enough," his father said, hoping to encourage him. "That would be true enough for another. Catherine knows she will never get Peter. Another man might get her, but I'm always reminding her of Peter." She told him the truth one day, that if she did not marry Peter she would marry no one, and James felt like dying. He grew pale and could not speak. At last he said, "How is that?" "I don't know. I don't know, James. But you mustn't talk to me about marriage again." And he had to promise her not to speak of marriage again, and he kept his word. At the end of the year she asked him if he had any news of Peter. "The last news we had of him was about a month ago, and he said he hoped to be admitted into the minor orders." And a few days afterwards he heard that Catherine had decided to go into a convent. "So this is the way it has ended," he thought. And he seemed no longer fit for work on the farm. He was seen about the road smoking, and sometimes he went down to the ball-alley, and sat watching the games in the evening. It was thought that he would take to drink, but he took to fishing instead, and was out all day in his little boat on the lake, however hard the wind might blow. The fisherman said he had seen him in the part of the lake where the wind blew the hardest, and that he could hardly pull against the waves. "His mind is away. I don't think he'll do any good in this country," his father said.