by Jove! Where on earth have you sprung from?"

Holderness threw down his pen and held out both his hands. Macheson drew
a long sigh of relief.

"From the pigsties, Dick. Whew! It's good to see you again--to be here!"

Holderness surveyed his friend critically.

"What have you been up to?" he asked. "Look washed out, as though you'd
had a fever or something. I've been expecting to see you every day."

"I've been on a pleasure trip to Paris," Macheson answered. "Don't talk
about it, for God's sake."

Holderness roared with laughter.

"You poor idiot!" he exclaimed. "Been on the razzle-dazzle, I believe. I
wish I'd known. I'd have come."

"It's all very well to laugh," Macheson answered. "I feel like a man
who's been living in a sewer."

"Are you cured?" Holderness asked abruptly.

Macheson hesitated. As yet he had not dared to ask himself that
question. Holderness watched the struggle in his face.

"I'm sorry I asked you that," he said quietly. "Look here! I know what
you've come to me for, and I can give it you. You can start at once if
you like."

"Work?" Macheson asked eagerly. "You mean that?"

"Of course! Tons of it! Henwood's at his wits' end in Stepney. He's
started lecturing, and the thing's taken on, but he can't go on night
after night. We don't want anything second-rate either. Then I want help
with the paper."

"I'll help you with the paper as soon as you like," Macheson declared.
"I'd like to go to Stepney, too, but could we hit it, Henwood and I?"

"Of course," Holderness answered. "What are you thinking of, man? You
haven't become a straw-splitter, have you?"

"Not I," Macheson answered "but you have crystallized your ideas into a
cult, haven't you? I might find myself on the other side of the traces."

"Rot!" Holderness answered vigorously. "Look here! This is what we call
ugliness and dirt. We say that these things make for misery. We say that
it is every man's duty, and every woman's, too, to keep themselves clean
and clean-living, for the sake of the community. We take the Christian
code. It is the most complete, the most philosophic, the most beautiful.
We preach it not from the Christian standpoint, but from the point of
view of the man of common sense. Doctrinal religions are all very well
in their way, but the great bald fact remains that the truth has not
been vouchsafed to us through any of them. Therefore we say live the
life and wait. From a scientific point of view we belie