It happened that Charles had as yet had occasion to publish but a single fiction ("The Truth About Jennie"; see "Favorite Magazine," for August, 1910). He had, indeed, as much need of a private chaplain as of a secretary. The peculiarities of the case, thus, often struck and amused him; and they did so now as, opening the door of the bedroom, hatted and coated, he saw his secretary's still youthful head bowed pleasantly over the magazine. "Ah, my dear fellow, there you are!" said the secretary, with just a little jump. And putting down his reading-matter in a manner suggesting that, of course, he had had to kill time somehow while waiting for Charles, he went on at once in an agreeable confidential voice:-- "By the by, I intended to ask you--you've heard about this Miss Trevenna? Gad, you know, Charles! Her father won't let her name be mentioned!" The employer eyed him gravely, pulling on his gloves. The story alluded to was not unknown to him: how one modern girl, claiming more Freedom than existed, had too rashly crossed the great gulf, and how, her enterprise proving fatally unsuccessful, she had lately come home again. He felt very sorry for Miss Trevenna. "Fact!--her mother visits her in secret, in lodgings," said his secretary, dropping his eager voice further. "A sad case--sad, yes--but, my dear fellow, can we allow our girls to run off with other people's husbands? No! Morals," said Judge Blenso, sternly, "are the bulwark of the nation!--that's what _I_ say! Am I right, Charles?" [Illustration: "NO! MORALS ARE THE BULWARK OF THE NATION!"] Charles said that he was perfectly right. He then proposed that the Judge should knock off work for the night, forthwith. But the Judge looked rather shocked at the suggestion, and began to clack vigorously at Dionysius. "There's really no hurry about this short stuff, you know. Why not go down and cheer Mrs. Herman up a bit? She always appreciates a call from you." The relative's hand irresistibly rose to his mustache. "A fine woman, a charmin' fine widow-woman," said he, in his rich voice. "But!--business _before_ pleasure, Charles. That's _my_ way, my boy." However, the ringing motto seemed a little too good to live up to. Hardly had the front door shut on Charles when Judge Blenso--he rather insisted on the official title, now that he was secretary--hooded his old typewriter for the night, turned down the light in the green-domed lamp on the table, and descended to visit his landlady. That he had small reverence for his half-uncle's New Thinking now became clear. The Judge left the Studio (as he himself had christened it), chuckling silently to himself, and on the steps began to chant aloud a sort of gay recitative of his own composition. The chant went a beat to every step, thus: "Cracking--piffle--walnuts--piffle--in a--sort of--piffle--sadness!" II