ssion.

"Very well."

"And Barney Bill?"

"He upbraids me bitterly for what I have said."

Paul smiled at the curiously stilted phrase.

"Tell him from me not to do it. My love to them both."

They shook hands again, and Paul drove off in the motor car that had
been placed at his disposal during the election, and Silas continued
his sober walk with his committee-men up the muddy street. Whereupon
Paul conceived a sudden hatred for the car. It was but the final
artistic touch to this comedy of mockery of which he had been the
victim.... Perhaps God was on his father's side, after all--on the side
of them who humbly walked and not of them who rode in proud chariots.
But his political creed, his sociological convictions rose in protest.
How could the Almighty be in league with all that was subversive of
social order, all that was destructive to Imperial cohesion, all that
which inevitably tended to England's downfall?

He turned suddenly to his companion, the Conservative agent.

"Do you think God has got common sense?"

The agent, not being versed in speculations regarding the attributes of
the Deity, stared; then, disinclined to commit himself, took refuge in
platitude.

"God moves in a mysterious way, Mr. Savelli."

"That's rot," said Paul. "If there's an Almighty, He must move in a
common-sense way; otherwise the whole of this planet would have busted
up long ago. Do you think it's common sense to support the present
Government?"

"Certainly not," said the agent, fervently.

"Then if God supported it, it wouldn't be common sense on His part. It
would be merely mysterious?"

"I see what you're driving at," said the agent. "Our opponent
undoubtedly has been making free with the name of the Almighty in his
speeches. As a matter of fact he's rather crazy on the subject. I don't
think it would be a bad move to make a special reference to it. It's
all damned hypocrisy. There's a chap in the old French play--what's his
name?"

"Tartuffe."

"That's it. Well, there you are. That speech of his yesterday--now why
don't you take it and wring religiosity and hypocrisy and Tartuffism
out of it? You know how to do that sort of thing. You can score
tremendously. I never thought of it before. By George! you can get him
in the neck if you like."

"But I don't like," said Paul. "I happen to know that Mr. Finn is
sincere in his convictions."

"But, my dear sir, what does his supposed sincerity matter in political