ou dear, dear
friend, and lead you into the Truth of His own plain statements of the
facts you have to face."

Cohen was quiet, subdued, almost sad. Then, as if to bridge an awkward
moment, he said, with a forced eagerness:

"Why not come to the opening of the Temple yourself, instead of sending
a representative to report to your paper?"

Ralph shook his head; "I could not get away, dear friend."

He did not voice the actual thing which weighed with him, that any day
now he might cease to be Editor of the "Courier."

The two men shook hands, and parted as men part who never expect to
meet again.

Bastin left alone dropped into a "brown study." He was suddenly
recalled to the present, by the arrival of the mail. The most
important packet bore the handwriting of Sir Archibald Carlyon, Ralph's
proprietor.

He smiled as he broke the envelope, recalling the thought of his heart
only twenty minutes ago, and wondering whether his foreboding was now
to be verified.

The letter was as kindly in its tone as Sir Archibald's letters ever
were. But it was none the less emphatic. After kindliest greetings,
and a few personal items, it went on:

"All the strange happenings of the past months have strangely unnerved
me. I cannot understand things, 'I dunno where I are,' as that curious
catch-saying of the nineteenth century put it. I live like a man in a
troubled dream, a night-mare. Several members of our church have been
taken, and I, who prided myself on my strict churchmanship, have been
left behind. My boon companion, the rector of our parish, a man who
always seemed to me to be the beau ideal clergyman, he too is left, and
is as puzzled and angry as I am. I think he is more angry and
mortified than I am, because his pride is hurt at every point, since,
as the Spiritual head (nominally at least) of this parish, he has not
only been passed over by this wonderful translation of spiritual
persons, but being left behind he has no excuse to offer for it.

"The curate of our church and his wife, whom we always spoke of as
being 'a bit _peculiar_,' they disappeared when the others did. By the
bye, Bastin, good fellow, what constitutes '_peculiarity_,' in this
sense? It seems to me now, that to be out and out for God--as that
good fellow and his wife were, as well as one or two others in our
parish--is the real peculiarity of such people. God help us, what
fools we have been!

"Our village shopkeeper, a dissent