h shrill excitement. "Are you a damned
government agent? If so, take your poison and get out."

The tall stranger in his impressive uniform stood erect and unabashed.
With affectionate care he gave the tumblers a final musical stir.

"O ye of little faith!" he said calmly. The sadness of the
misunderstood idealist grieved his features. "Have you forgotten the
miracle of Cana?" From his pocket he took a card and laid it on the
desk.

Bleak seized it. It said:

THE CORPORATION FOR THE PERPETUATION OF HAPPINESS

1316 Caraway Street

Virgil Quimbleton, Associate Director

He stared at the pasteboard, stupefied, and handed it to the city
editor.

Meanwhile the three reporters had drawn near. Light-hearted and
irresponsible souls, unoppressed by the embittered suspicion of their
superiors, they nosed the floating aroma with candid hilarity.

"The breath of Eden!" said one.

"It's a warm evening," remarked another, with seeming irrelevance.

The face of Virgil Quimbleton, the man in gray, relaxed again at these
marks of honest appreciation. He waved an encouraging arm over the
crystals. "With the compliments of the Corporation," he repeated.

Bleak and the city editor looked again at the card, and at each other.
They scanned the face of their mysterious benefactor. Bleak's hand went
out to the nearest glass. He raised it to his lips. An almost-forgotten
formula recurred to him. "Down the rat-hole!" he cried, and tilted his
arm. The others followed suit, and the associate director watched them
with a glow of perfect altruism.

The glasses were still in air when the cartoonist emerged from his
room. "Holy cat!" he cried in amazement. "What's going on?" He seized
one of the empty vessels and sniffed it.

"Treason!" he exclaimed. "Who's been robbing the mint?"

"Maybe you can have one too," said Bleak, and turned to where
Quimbleton had been standing. But the mysterious visitor had leff the
room.

"You're too late, Bill," said the city editor genially. "There was a
kind of Messiah here, but he's gone. Tough luck."

"Say, boss," suggested one of the reporters. "There's a story in this.
May I interview that guy?"

Bleak picked up the card and put it in his pocket. A heavenly warmth
pervaded his mental fabric. "A story?" he said. "Forget it! This is no
story. It's a legend of the dear dead past. I'll cover this assignment
myself."

He borrowed a match and lit his pipe. Then he put on his coat and hat
and lef