“And John held his peace through it all,” a full fresh voice broke in. “‘It may be so,’ says John. ‘Doubtless, in your belief, it _is_ so,’ says John. ‘Your words move me mightily,’ says John, and gorges his own beliefs like a pike going backwards. And that young fool, so busy spinning words--words--words--that he trips past Hell Mouth without seeing it!... Who’s yonder, Joan?” “One of your English. ’Always late. Look!” A young girl with short-cropped hair pointed with her sword across the plain towards a single faltering figure which made at first as though to overtake the Convoy, but then turned left towards the Lower Establishment, who were enthusiastically cheering him as a leader of enterprise. “That’s my traitor,” said St. Peter. “He has no business to report to the Lower Establishment before reporting to Convoy.” The figure’s pace slackened as he neared the applauding line. He looked over his shoulder once or twice, and then fairly turned tail and fled again towards the still Convoy. “Nobody ever gave me credit for anything I did,” he began, sobbing and gesticulating. “They were all against me from the first. I only wanted a little encouragement. It was a regular conspiracy, but _I_ showed ’em what I could do! _I_ showed ’em! And--and--” he halted again. “Oh, God! What are you going to do with _me_?” No one offered any suggestion. He ranged sideways like a doubtful dog, while across the plain the Lower Establishment murmured seductively. All eyes turned to St. Peter. “At this moment,” the Saint said half to himself, “I can’t recall any precise ruling under which----” “My own case?” the ever-ready Judas suggested. “No-o! That’s making too much of it. And yet----” “Oh, hurry up and get it over,” the man wailed, and told them all that he had done, ending with the cry that none had ever recognised his merits; neither his own narrow-minded people, his inefficient employers, nor the snobbish jumped-up officers of his battalion. “You see,” said St. Peter at the end. “It’s sheer vanity. It isn’t even as if we had a woman to fall back upon.” “Yet there was a woman or I’m mistaken,” said the picket with the pleasing voice who had praised John. “Eh--what? When?” St. Peter turned swiftly on the speaker. “Who was the woman?” “The wise woman of Tekoah,” came the smooth answer. “I remember, because that verse was the private heart of my plays--some of ’em.” But the Saint was not listening. “You have it!” he cried. “Samuel Two, Double Fourteen. To think that _I_ should have forgotten! ‘For we must needs die and are as water spilled on the ground which cannot be gathered up again. Neither doth God respect any person, _yet_--’ Here you! Listen to this!” The man stepped forward and stood to attention. Some one took his cap as Judas and the picket John closed up beside him.