“Optician, rather, since he carried his own stock of glasses. In fact that’s where his profit came in. He advertised treatment free and charged two or three dollars for the glasses, special rates to schoolchildren. The scheme is an old one and a devilish. Half of the children in San Luis Obispo County, where I chanced upon his trail, were wearing his vision-twisters by the time he was through with them.” “What kind of glasses were they?” “Sometimes magnifying lenses. Mostly just plain window glass. Few children escaped him, for he would tell the parents that only prompt action could avert blindness.” “At least the plain glass couldn’t hurt the children,” suggested Mrs. Clyde. “Couldn’t it! It couldn’t fail to hurt them. Modify the sight of a delicate instrument like a child’s eye continuously by the most transparent of barriers, and it is bound to go wrong soon. The magnifying glasses are far worse. There are hundreds of children in that one locality alone who will carry the stigma of his quackery throughout their lives.” “Do you think he is here with a view to practicing his amiable trade?” inquired Clyde. “Only in part, if at all. I understand that he has changed his line.” “How comes he by all that showy money, then?” “By murder.” The Clydes, accustomed to their physician’s hammerstroke turns of speech, took this under consideration. “But he wasn’t committing murder in the church just now, I suppose,” insinuated Mrs. Clyde at length. “Not directly. His immediate business there, I suspect, was bribery.” “Of whom?” “The minister.” “Oh, come, Strong!” protested Mr. Clyde. “Mr. Huddleston isn’t an intellectual giant, I grant you; but he’s certainly a well-meaning and honorable old fellow.” “Some cynical philosopher has remarked that wicked men have a talent for doing harm, but fools have a genius. Mr. Huddleston’s goodness and honesty, taken in connection with his hopeless ignorance of human nature, are just so much capital to hand for a scoundrel like this Gray.” “What does he expect to get for his twenty-dol-lar bill?” “First, a reputation for piety and generosity. Second, that reputation duly certified to by the leading minister of the town.” “In other words, a testimonial.” “Precisely. For home use, and cheap at twenty dollars. Preparatory to operating in a town, your itinerating quack bribes two people—if he can. First, the editor of the local paper; second, the pastor of the leading church. The editor usually takes the money with his eyes wide open; the minister with his eyes tight shut.” “How can his eyes be shut to such a business?” asked Mrs. Clyde. “Because so much dust has been thrown in them by the so-called religious journals.” “Surely you don’t mean that religious journals exploit quackery in their pages!” cried Mrs. Clyde.