made Him the Captain of my life.' And then, don't you see, he stopped
being shut in inside himself any longer. He began to love me and be
gentle to me. Louis, do you know, I believe you're tackling this worry
in the wrong way. It can't be right--being rude to me, growling all the
time about your father and mother--thinking, thinking, thinking all the
time about yourself and your weakness until the whole universe is
yourself and your weakness. Can't you see how bad it is, you who are a
doctor? You know the old saying about giving a dog a bad name and
hanging him. Louis, you're giving yourself a bad name, and hanging
yourself."

"Oh, I say, Marcella," he gasped. "Do you think--" he broke off, and
groaned again.

"Louis, I _know_. I don't _think_ anything about it! The other day I was
reading a most extraordinary book the schoolmaster lent me. It was about
St. Francis of Assisi. It said that, by contemplation of the wounds of
Christ, in time he came to feeling pain in his hands and feet and
side--"

"Balderdash!" muttered Louis impatiently. "Auto-suggestion!"

"Auto--what's that?" she asked. He explained and she cried out eagerly:

"Well, can't you see you're doing exactly the same thing? And you call
it balderdash when other people do it! Those wounds of St. Francis were
called the Stigmata--can't you see that you're giving yourself the
stigmata of drunkenness?"

"I've got them," he cried hoarsely. "I'm done. I'm even a thief."

"Oh, you idiot! How sorry I am for my father! He used to call me an
idiot, and have me to put up with. And now I've got you, and you're a
thousand times denser than ever I was! You're neither a drunkard nor a
thief, Louis. Look here, to begin with, how much do you owe Fred? You
shall have all I've got. If I give it to you you can't be a thief any
more."

Between them they had just enough money for Fred and a few shillings
left. He wept as she fastened it in an envelope and asked him to take it
along to Fred's cabin at once.

"I--I s-say, Marcella. I--I--d-daren't," he groaned. "He'll ask me to
wet it. And I'll not be able to say no. And oh my God, I don't want to
do it any more."

"Then I'll take it," she said promptly, and darted along with it to
Number Fifteen, listened while Ole Fred said every insulting thing he
could about Louis and all Louis's ancestors and then calmly asked him
for a receipt for the money.

Louis was still sitting on the floor. He looked up, his bloodshot eyes