“You spoke of some hard blow Wayne had recently. Was it a woman?” asked Wingfield. “Yes,” the clergyman answered. “What was the matter with her?” growled Walsh resentfully. “I suppose it was my fault,” Paddock answered. “She is a fine woman--but she wasn’t quite free, as we look at it in the Church.” “And of course the Church couldn’t sacrifice itself,” Walsh grumbled. “It wasn’t as easy as that, Mr. Walsh. There were three people to consider, leaving the Church out entirely.” “Well, I’m for trying the monastery,” said Wingfield. “It can do no harm, and he may resume operations while we sit here talking about it.” “Mr. Paddock,” began Walsh, as his visitors rose, “do I understand you to say that a man can’t go to the bad if he works hard enough at it?” Walsh frowned so fiercely that Paddock laughed. “Oh, not so broad as that! But there are good influences at work in the world--you see evidences of them all around--and they are increasing all the time. And they make things harder for the ambitious sinner; he’s engaged in a sort of obstacle race.” “Um,” was Walsh’s only comment. He threw up the window of his cage that looked upon the wintry street and watched Wingfield and the clergyman picking their way cautiously through a battery of noisy trucks. The porters and clerks saw his bald pate hanging ominously above them in the crisp air, but the window closed with a bang without the usual malediction. Walsh growled to himself for a while and then, seeking an outlet for his emotions, summoned a frightened little stenographer whom he had threatened with dismissal that morning and raised her wages two dollars a week. * * * * * Wayne Craighill followed Paddock from the train at a station high in the Virginia hills. The poison had been steamed out of him, but his mind was still dull from its latest punishment. He had been glad in the first hours of his reaction to have Paddock’s sympathy and he had agreed to leave town with the minister without quite comprehending where they were going. A buckboard was waiting and they were soon off, threading their way through the snowy hills. Wayne stared ahead indifferently, and when they reached a lonely stone house, perched high on a rough crag, he accepted this as their destination unquestioningly. And so he came to the house of the Brothers of Bethlehem. Stoddard himself flung the door open--a tall man of thirty-five, alert, quick of movement and ready of speech. It was, it seemed, the most natural thing in the world that Wayne Craighill should be there--no questions asked, no discussion of the reasons for his coming, no time fixed for his departure, no laying down of rules.