? What fiery mission
are you upon? I believe you're getting too much wrapped up in private
fads and fancies. Why don't you come and work for us at St. Chad's?"

"He's one of those clever people who can always criticize with intense
fervor," said Chator bitterly. He was still very red and ruffled, and
Michael felt rather penitent.

"I wish I _could_ work here. Chator, do forgive me for being so
offensive. I really have no right to criticize, because my own vice is
inability to do anything in company with other people. The very sight of
workers in cooperation freezes me into apathy. If I were a priest, I
should probably feel like you that the children were the most important.
Have neither of you ever heard of anybody whose faith was confirmed by
the realization of evil? Usually, it's the other way about, isn't it?
I've met many unbelievers who first began to doubt, because the problem
of evil upset their notions of divine efficiency. Chator, you have
forgiven me, haven't you?"

"I ought to have realized that you didn't mean half you were saying,"
said Chator.

Michael smiled. Should he start the argument again by insisting that he
had meant even twice as much as he had said? In the end, however, he let
Chator believe in his exaggeration, and they parted good friends.

Nigel Stewart came often to see him during the next fortnight, and he
was very anxious to find out why Michael was living in Leppard Street.
Michael would not tell him, however, but instead he introduced him to
Barnes who with money in his pocket was very independent and gave up
sign of his boasted ability to circumvent parsons financially. No doubt,
however, when he was thrown back on his own resources, he would benefit
greatly by this acquaintance. Stewart had a theory that Michael had shut
himself in Leppard Street to test the personality of Satan, and he used
to insist that Michael performed all kinds of magical experiments in his
solitude there. Having himself been a Satanist on several occasions at
Oxford, he felt less than Chator would have done the daring of
discussing Baudelaire and Huysmans. Deacon though he was, Nigel was
still an undergraduate, nor did it seem probable that he would ever
cease to be one. He tried to thrill Michael with some of his own
diabolic experiences, but Michael was a little contemptuous and told him
that his devil was merely a figure of academic naughtiness.

"All that kind of subjective wickedness is nothing at all,