NOT HALF DEAD.

NZ Truth, Issue 80, 29 December 1906, Page 8

NOT HALF DEAD.

Murdered Abbe Discovered Very

Much AHve

And Living with His Sweet

Lady-love.

A cablegram from the Brussels representative of an American paper bo hand told the following romantic tale: "The Abbe de ia Rue, cure of Cha*. tenay, who disappeared mysteriously several weeks ago, and for the. repose of whose "muirdered" soul Mass was j celebrated m the parish church of I Chatenay, has been discovered alive m .Brussels, m the company of a young schoolmistress of the village. It was only on Saturday that the magistrate issued a notification that there could no longer be any doubt that the unfortunate cure had been murdered and his body .buried m the peat hogs around Chatenay, . from which there was very little hope of its ever being recovered. "The Abbe, however, has only abandoned a profitable living, preferring to be thought i dead by father, mother and sister, m order to marry a pupil teacher of eighteen. His- parishioners have been most indignant at the suggestions of the newspapers that he was still alive. "The priest is living with his com- ! nanion m very/ poorly-furnished lodgings, and everything around him denotes thajfc he f s not m a 1 prosperous financial 'condition. NO TRAGEDY-A ROMANCE. ''There is no tragedy m my story,?' he said to, a Press representative; ''simply a romance, that is all. I loved this young lady here* whom I have brought up, and whom I trained as a pupil teacher m, the Chatenay J school. I have felt for a long time past that I have l>een living a life of hypocrisy, trying conscientiously to be a priest, and at the same time a lover. I found the two things impos-i sible for an honest-minded man; therefore, I decided to put an end to the double life I was leading. I determined to disappear/ to earn my own living under- anothei* name, and marry this dear girl. I am going to marry. Mdlle. Fremont, who has heen with ihe a fortnight. At present lam very hard up, having changed my last lOOf. note this morning. How will I earn my living-? Well. I expect to he appointed agent for some commercial firm. See here, a Paris jet manufacturer has already " sent me samples. After all, I .am an honest man." All very pretty indeed, but the correspondent makes no comment upon the j fact that the oriestly humbug had 'not- yet married the silly girl.