ial that'd do anny man good, no matter how bad
he was, and turn an angel of a woman into an archangel. Bless yer Bowl!"

When Christopher turned to lift down two pewter pots, Calhoun reached up
swiftly and took them from the shelf. He placed them in the hands of the
old man, who drew a clean towel of coarse linen from a small cupboard in
the wall above his head.

She and Dyck held the pots for the old man to pour the cordial into
them. As he said, there was only a good porridge-spoon of liqueur for
each. He divided it with anxious care.

"There's manny a man," he said, "and manny and manny a lady, too, born
in the purple, that'd be glad of a dhrink of this cordial from the
cellar of the bishop.

"Alpha, beta, gamma, delta is the code, and with the word delta," he
continued, "dhrink every drop of it, as if it was the last thing you
were dhrinking on earth; as if the Lord stooped down to give ye a cup of
blessing from His great flagon of eternal happiness. Ye've got two kind
hearts, but there's manny a day of throuble will come between ye and the
end; and yet the end'll be right, God love ye! Now-alpha, beta, gamma,
delta!"

With a merry laugh Dyck Calhoun turned up his cup and drained the liquid
to the last drop. With a laugh not quite so merry, Sheila raised her mug
and slowly drained the green happiness away.

"Isn't it good--isn't it like the love of God?" asked the old man.
"Ain't I glad I had it for ye? Why I said I hadn't annything for ye to
dhrink or eat, Lord only knows. There's nothing to eat, and there's only
this to dhrink, and I hide it away under the bedclothes of time, as one
might say. Ah, ye know, it's been there for three years, and I'd almost
forgot it. It was a little angel from heaven whispered it to me whir
ye stepped inside this house. I dunno why I kep' the stuff. Manny's the
time I was tempted to dhrink it myself, and manny's the time something
said to me, 'Not yet.' The Lord be praised, for I've had out of it more
than I deserve!"

He took the mugs from their hands, and for a minute stood like some
ancient priest who had performed a noble ritual. As Sheila looked at
him, she kept saying to herself:

"He's a spirit; he isn't a man!"

Dyck's eye met that of Sheila, and he saw with the same feeling what was
working in her heart.

"Well, we must be going," he said to Christopher Dogan. "We must get
homeward, and we've had a good drink--the best I ever tasted. We're
proud to pay our respe