"Acute nervous dyspepsia, complicated by a series of sittings under the rose, might eat away the most brazen self-confidence. That's as certain as that I wear whiskers and you don't. Shall we do an addition sum? Shall we add Chichester's discovery of secret lapses in his worshiped rector's life, to the nervous dyspepsia and the sittings? Shall we do that?" "And Lady Sophia?" "There's a sunflower type of woman. The rising sun can't escape her inevitable worship." "The change in Harding may be a natural one. But there is something portentous in the change in Chichester," said Malling. "You know I'm a rather cool hand, and certainly not inclined to easy credulity. But there's something about Chichester which--well, Professor, I'll make a confession to you that isn't a pleasant one for any man to make. There's something about Chichester which shakes my nerves." "And you haven't got nervous dyspepsia?" "Should I be even a meliorist--as I am--if I had?" "I must know Chichester. It's a pity I didn't know him formerly." "I don't believe that matters," said Malling, with intense conviction. "There is that in him which must strike you and affect you, whether you knew him as he was or not." "So long as I don't turn tail and run from him, all's well. I will tackle Chichester. In the interests of science I will face this curate. But how shall I approach him? As in golf, the approach is much, if not everything." He sat thinking for some minutes, with his eyebrows twitching. Then he said: "The question is, Should the approach be casual or direct? Shall I describe a curve, or come to him as the crow comes when making for a given point--or is said to come, for I've never investigated that matter? What do you say?" "It's very difficult to say. On the day I dined in Hornton Street, Chichester certainly wanted to tell me something. He asked me to dine, I am almost sure, in order that he might tell it to me." "About the sittings with Harding, no doubt." "That, perhaps, and something more." "But he told you nothing." "Directly." "Do you think he would be more or less likely to unbosom himself now than he was then?" "Less likely." "You might give me his address." Malling did so. The professor wrote the address down on a slip of paper, pinned the slip carefully to the yellow lining of his jacket, and then got up to go. But Malling detained him. "Professor," he said, speaking with an unusual hesitation, "you know why I told you all this." "In the interests of science?" "No, in the interest of that miserable man, Marcus Harding. I want you to break the link that binds him to Henry Chichester--if there is one. I want you to effect his release." "I'm afraid you've come to the wrong man," returned Stepton, dryly. "My object in entering into this matter is merely to increase my knowledge, not to destroy my chance of increasing it." "But surely--" "We shall never get forward if we move in the midst of a fog of pity and sentiment."