ld have been in all the
papers a year ago. The details immediately following he will find
particularly hard to accept, because among other things they involve the
conclusion that he or she, the reader in question, must have been killed
in a violent and unprecedented manner more than a year ago. Now a
miracle is nothing if not improbable, and as a matter of fact the reader
_was_ killed in a violent and unprecedented manner a year ago. In the
subsequent course of this story that will become perfectly clear and
credible, as every right-minded and reasonable reader will admit. But
this is not the place for the end of the story, being but little beyond
the hither side of the middle. And at first the miracles worked by Mr.
Fotheringay were timid little miracles--little things with the cups and
parlour fitments, as feeble as the miracles of Theosophists, and, feeble
as they were, they were received with awe by his collaborator. He would
have preferred to settle the Winch business out of hand, but Mr. Maydig
would not let him. But after they had worked a dozen of these domestic
trivialities, their sense of power grew, their imagination began to show
signs of stimulation, and their ambition enlarged. Their first larger
enterprise was due to hunger and the negligence of Mrs. Minchin, Mr.
Maydig's housekeeper. The meal to which the minister conducted Mr.
Fotheringay was certainly ill-laid and uninviting as refreshment for two
industrious miracle-workers; but they were seated, and Mr. Maydig was
descanting in sorrow rather than in anger upon his housekeeper's
shortcomings, before it occurred to Mr. Fotheringay that an opportunity
lay before him. "Don't you think, Mr. Maydig," he said, "if it isn't a
liberty, _I_----"

"My dear Mr. Fotheringay! Of course! No--I didn't think."

Mr. Fotheringay waved his hand. "What shall we have?" he said, in a
large, inclusive spirit, and, at Mr. Maydig's order, revised the supper
very thoroughly. "As for me," he said, eyeing Mr. Maydig's selection, "I
am always particularly fond of a tankard of stout and a nice Welsh
rarebit, and I'll order that. I ain't much given to Burgundy," and
forthwith stout and Welsh rarebit promptly appeared at his command. They
sat long at their supper, talking like equals, as Mr. Fotheringay
presently perceived, with a glow of surprise and gratification, of all
the miracles they would presently do. "And, by the bye, Mr. Maydig,"
said Mr. Fotheringay, "I might perhaps be