f they could have
their way, they would strip you of your clerical broadcloth and robe
you in a full suit of angelic eider down. Still, you needn't look smug,
while you deny it; it's nothing to be proud about. It's not your
preaching does it, man; it's chiefly on account of your voice, and the
way your hair sprouts from your scalp. For pure purposes of religion, a
hairy baritone is a long way more potent than a bald and quavering
tenor; at least, so far as the youthful student is concerned. But
what's the tonic?"

Obediently Brenton had dropped down into the chair, the cane thing.
First, though, he had deposited his hat and stick upon the nearest
table and hunted out the siphon, as Opdyke had suggested. Then,--

"The doctor says it's for my spiritual doubtings," he answered.
"Myself, I more than half suspect it's for my sense of humour."

"Hm!" Opdyke commented crisply. "They're only husband and wife--after
the divorce. What's the row?"

The answer came only in a little sigh, curiously like a groan.

Reed half closed his eyes, and peered up at Brenton through the crack.

"Mental growing pains?" he queried. "Too bad, old man. I thought you
had passed that epoch; it generally comes with the cutting of one's
wisdom teeth. Anyhow, we all go through it sooner or later."

"Sometimes both," Brenton answered restlessly.

Reed's eyes opened, with a snap.

"You've been through it once before? Of course. I remember now; you
started as an ultra-Calvinist, and came over with a flop. Whittenden of
Saint Luke's told me. He always claimed he was the man who did the
deed."

"You knew Whittenden?" For the moment, Brenton forgot all other matters
in the question.

"Rather! And it's not the sort of privilege one is likely to forget. He
is 'the whole state of Christ's Church Militant' in his own stubby,
curly-headed little person." Reed's voice grew resonant with every
syllable.

"I know." Brenton nodded. "Where did you run across him?"

"In Colorado. A cousin of his had lungs, and Whittenden put in his
whole vacation, two years ago, helping the man keep from being too
badly bored. We had an accident; a cage fell and smashed a dozen
miners. Every single man of them was at the end of things, and they
were Catholics. Most of them couldn't speak ten words of English. The
nearest priest was across the divide, ten miles away, and the poor
beggars hadn't ten minutes to wait. They knew that, according to their
religion, it meant e