ow into the street below,
full now of young men and girls; some with set faces, hurrying, intent,
others romping and laughing as they dodged the trucks and trolley cars;
all on their way to the great shoe factory around the corner, the huge
funnels of which were belching forth smoke into the morning air. The
street emptied, a bell rang, a whistle blew, the hum of distant machinery
began . . . .

II

Later that morning Hodder sat in his study. The shutters were closed,
and the intensity of the tropical glare without was softened and diffused
by the slanting green slats. His eye wandered over the long and
comfortable room which had been his sanctuary in the feverish days of
his ministry, resting affectionately on the hospitable chairs, the wide
fireplace before which he had been wont to settle himself on winter
nights, and even on the green matting--a cooling note in summer. And
there, in the low cases along the walls, were the rows of his precious
books,--his one hobby and extravagance. He had grown to love the room.
Would he ever come back to it?

A step sounded in the hall, a knock, and the well-known gaunt form and
spectacled face of McCrae appeared in the doorway.

"Ye wished to see me?" he asked.

"McCrae," said the rector, "I am going off for a while."

His assistant regarded him a moment in silence. Although Hodder had no
intention of explaining his reasons, he had a curious conviction that it
were superfluous to do so, that McCrae had guessed them.

"Why shouldn't ye? There's but a handful left to preach to in this
weather."

"I wouldn't go, in this sudden way, if it were not imperative," Hodder
added, trying to speak calmly.

"Why shouldn't ye?" McCrae repeated, almost fiercely.

Hodder smiled in spite of himself.

"There's no reason," he said, "except the added work put on you without
warning, and in this heat."

"Ye'll not need to worry," his assistant assured him, "the heat's nothing
to me." McCrae hesitated, and then demanded abruptly, "Ye'll not be
visiting?"

The question took Hodder by surprise.

"No," he answered quickly, and not quite steadily, and hesitated in his
turn, "I shan't be visiting."

"It's a rest ye need, I've been wanting to say it." McCrae took a step
forward, and for a moment it seemed as though he were at last about to
break the bonds of his reserve. Perhaps he detected an instinctive
shrinking on the rector's part. At any rate, there was another instant
of silen