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temptation. There should be very little trouble a boy could get into out here, armed as he was with only a rosary, a flint, a penknife, and a prayerbook. So it seemed to Father Cheroki. But this confession was taking up quite a lot of time; he wished the boy would get on with it. His arthritis was bothering him again, but because of the presence of the Holy Sacrament on the portable table which he took with him on his rounds, the priest preferred to stand, or to stay on his knees along with the penitent. He had lighted a candle before the small golden case which contained the Hosts, but the flame was invisible in the sun-glare, and the breeze might even have blown it out.
    “But exorcism is permissible these days, without any specific higher authorization. What are you confessing-being angry?”
    “That too.”
    “At whom did you become angry? At the old man-or at yourself for almost taking the food?”
    “I-I’m not sure.”
    “Well, make up your mind,” Father Cheroki said impatiently. “Either accuse yourself, or else not.”
    “I accuse myself.”
    “Of what?” Cheroki sighed.
    “Of abusing a sacramental in a fit of temper.”
    “ ‘Abusing’? You had no rational reason to suspect diabolic influence? You just became angry and squirted him with it? Like throwing the ink in his eye?”
    The novice squirmed and hesitated, sensing the priest’s sarcasm. Confession was always difficult for Brother Francis. He could never find the right words for his misdeeds, and in trying to remember his own motives, he became hopelessly confused. Nor was the priest helping matters by taking the “either-you-did-or-else-you-didn’t” stand-even though, obviously, either Francis had or else he hadn’t.
    “I think I lost my senses for a moment,” he said finally.
    Cheroki opened his mouth, apparently meaning to pursue the matter, then thought better of it. “I see. What next then?”
    “Gluttonous thoughts,” Francis said after a moment.
    The priest sighed. “I thought we were through with that. Or is this another time?”
    “Yesterday. There was this lizard, Father. It had blue and yellow stripes, and such magnificent hams-thick as your thumb and plump, and I kept thinking how it would taste like chicken, roasted all brown and crisp outside, and-”
    “All right,” the priest interrupted. Only a hint of revulsion crossed his aged face. After all, the boy was spending a lot of time in the sun. “You took pleasure in these thoughts? You didn’t try to get rid of the temptation?”
    Francis reddened. “I-I tried to catch it. It got away.”
    “So, not merely thought-deed as well. Just that one time?”
    “Well-yes, just that.”
    “All right, in thought and deed, willfully meaning to eat meat during Lent. Please be as specific as you can after this. I thought you had examined your conscience properly. Is there anything else?’
    “Quite a lot.”
    The priest winced. He had several hermitages to visit; it was a long hot ride, and his knees were hurting. Please get on with it as quickly as you can,” he sighed.
    “Impurity, once.”
    “Thought, word, or deed?”
    “Well, there was this succubus, and she-”
    “Succubus? Oh-nocturnal. You were asleep?”
    “Yes, but-”
    “Then why confess it?”
    “Because afterwards.”
    “Afterwards what? When you woke up?”
    “Yes. I kept thinking about her. Kept imagining it all over again.”
    “All right, concupiscent thought, deliberately entertained. You’re sorry? Now, what next?”
    All this was the usual sort of thing that one kept hearing time after endless time from postulant after postulant, novice after novice, and it seemed to Father Cheroki that the least Brother Francis could do would be to bark out his self-accusations one, two, three, in a neat orderly manner, without all this prodding and prompting. Francis seemed to find difficulty in formulating whatever he was about to say; the priest waited.
    “I think my vocation has come to me, Father,