woman who has lost her way or the man who has
succumbed to a destructive thirst. That required only the remembrance
that the "wages of sin is death." But if real estate which he owned in
poor, even disreputable sections of distant cities brought him in
surprisingly large rentals, he did not conceive that his duty required
an investigation of the characters of his tenants.

Of course should his agents tell him that his property was being
prostituted to evil ends for gain he would have to sever relations with
them, but he selected agents who troubled him with no such embarrassing
details. This was a practical attitude, but something told him that in
it Conscience would hardly see eye to eye with him.

It was late in May that Jimmy Hancock wrote a note to the girl with whom
he had ridden horseback in the Valley of Virginia.

"I've just had a stroke of luck," he said, "in meeting our old friend
Stuart Farquaharson, who is touring the world, crowned gorgeously with
bays of literary fame. I ran into him yesterday in Yokohama and from him
learned for the first time of your marriage. If I am the last to
congratulate you, at least I am among the first in heartiness and
sincerity....

"There are some charming Americans here--though I don't think of any
others whom I should mention as common acquaintances. Or did you know
Mrs. Larry Holbury? She has been reigning graciously over us, and I am
among the smitten. However, since both she and Stuart are to sail on the
_Nippon Maru_ I have no great modicum of hope."

Poor Jimmy! Never was man less bent on purveying morsels of deleterious
gossip. Never was man, in effect, more stupidly blundering.

He wrote the day after the dance on his cruiser and he spoke of the
things near his current thoughts.

When Conscience had read the note, her eyes wandered thoughtfully and at
the end her lips curled. "So she followed him across the world, did
she?" she said half aloud, since she was quite alone. Then she added
quietly: "Still I guess she didn't pursue him without knowing that she
would be welcome. It was just as well that the dream ended in time."

Until his stroke had disabled the Reverend William Williams, his
congregation had thought of him less as an individual than as an
institution. In their minds he had shared the permanence of the church
steeple. Trained through two generations to his intensity and fiery
earnestness they saw in other clergymen a tame half-heartedness.
Expon