the concentration of the
man on the task before him the rector read a design, an implication that
the affairs of the Church were of a minor importance: sensed, indeed,
the new attitude of hostility, gazed upon the undiscovered side, the
dangerous side before which other men had quailed. Alison's words
recurred to him, "they are afraid of you, they will crush you if they
can." Eldon Parr betrayed, at any rate, no sign of fear. If his mental
posture were further analyzed, it might be made out to contain an
intimation that the rector, by some act, had forfeited the right
to the unique privilege of the old relationship.

Well, the fact that the banker had, in some apparently occult manner,
been warned, would make Hodder's task easier--or rather less difficult.
His feelings were even more complicated than he had anticipated. The
moments of suspense were trying to his nerves, and he had a shrewd notion
that this making men wait was a favourite manoeuvre of Eldon Parr's; nor
had he underrated the benumbing force of that personality. It was
evident that the financier intended him to open the battle, and he was
--as he had expected--finding it difficult to marshal the regiments of his
arguments. In vain he thought of the tragedy of Garvin . . . . The
thing was more complicated. And behind this redoubtable and sinister
Eldon Parr he saw, as it were, the wraith of that: other who had once
confessed the misery of his loneliness. . . .

At last the banker rang, sharply, the bell on his desk. A secretary
entered, to whom he dictated a telegram which contained these words:
"Langmaid has discovered a way out." It was to be sent to an address in
Texas. Then he turned in his chair and crossed his knees, his hand
fondling an ivory paper-cutter. He smiled a little.

"Well, Mr. Hodder," he said.

The rector, intensely on his guard, merely inclined his head in
recognition that his turn had come.

"I was sorry," the banker continued, after a perceptible pause,--that
you could not see your way clear to have come with me on the cruise."

"I must thank you again," Hodder answered, "but I felt--as I wrote you
--that certain matters made it impossible for me to go."

"I suppose you had your reasons, but I think you would have enjoyed the
trip. I had a good, seaworthy boat--I chartered her from Mr. Lieber, the
president of the Continental Zinc, you know. I went as far as Labrador.
A wonderful coast, Mr. Hodder."

"It must be," agreed the