ke I teach oder ladies who pay me
many dollare. Do you know vhat I am?"

Yes, she knew what he was--he was the organist at All Saints', Belgravia.

"Pooh! I am a composer as veil. I write songs, and all your countrymen
and countryvomen sing dem. I haf a choral company, too, and it is for dat
I vant you. I go to de first houses in de land, de lords, de ministers,
de princes. You shall come vith me. Your voice is soprano--no,
mezzo-soprano--and it vill grow. I vill pitch it, and vhen it is ready I
vill bring you out. But now get away from dis place and naivare come
back, or I vill be more angry as before."

Then Glory rose, and he led her to the door. Her heart felt big and her
eyes were glistening. Aggie was in the refreshment-room. Having finished
for the night, the girl had resumed her outdoor costume without removing
her make-up, and was laughing merrily among a group of men and playing
them off against Charlie, who was still in the sulks and drinking at the
bar. When Glory appeared, Aggie fidgeted with her glove and said, "Aren't
you going to see us home, Charlie?"

"No," said Charlie.

"Where are you going to?"

"Nowhere as you can come."

Aggie's eyes watered, and she wrenched a button off, but she only laughed
and answered, "Don't think as we're throwing ourselves at _your_ head, my
man! We only wanted to _know_. Ta-ta!"

It was now midnight, and the streets were thin of people, but sounds of
music and dancing came from nearly every open window and door.

Aggie was crying. "That's the worst of the clubs," she said, "they lead
'em to the gambling hells. And then a young man always knows when he can
tyke advantage."

As they returned past the Swiss club somebody who was being thrown out
into the street was shouting in a gurgling voice, "Let go o' my throat or
I'll corpse ye!" And farther on two or three girls in their teens, with
their arms about the necks of twice as many men, were reeling along the
pavement and singing in a tuneless wail.

XV.

Toward the middle of Lent the Society of the Holy Gethsemane was visited
by its ecclesiastical Visitor. This was the Bishop of the diocese, a
liberal-minded man and not a very rigid ecclesiastic, abrupt, brusque,
businesslike, and a good administrator. When the brothers had gathered in
the community room, he took from the Superior the leathern-bound volume
containing the rule of the Brotherhood and read aloud the text of it.

"And now, gentlemen," he s