“It was no good going home to knock around and no use discussing such a thing with my family, and I knew people would think me crazy. Stoddard was going West, to do missionary stunts in Michigan, where there were more lumber camps, so I went along. I used to help him with the lumber-jacks, and try to keep the booze out of them; and first thing I knew he had me reading and getting ready for orders; he said I’d better keep clear of divinity schools; and I guess he had figured it out that if I got too much divinity I would get scared and back water. Then I went home and broke the news to the family. They didn’t take much stock in it; they thought I would take a tumble and be a worse disgrace than ever. But there was plenty of money and I had no head for business, anyhow, and there was a chance that I might become respectable, so I got ordained very quietly three years ago at a mission away up on Lake Superior where a bishop had taken an interest in me--and here I am.” The minister drew a pipe from his pocket, filled and lighted it, shaking his head at Craighill’s offer of a cigar. “Thanks; I prefer this. Hope the smoke won’t be painful to you; it’s a brand they affect out in my suburb, but it’s better than what we used to have up in the lumber camps. I still take the comfort of a pipe, but the drink I cut out and the swearing. As I remember, it was you who taught me to cuss in school because my stammering made it sound so funny.” Wayne had recalled a good many things about Paddock but the mood he had brought from his father’s house did not yield readily to the confessions of this boyhood friend who had reappeared in the livery of the Christian ministry. The new status was difficult for Craighill to accept and, conscious of the antagonism his recital had awakened, Paddock regretted that he had volunteered his story. The Craighill whom he had known was a big, generous, outspoken fellow whom everybody liked; the man before him was morose and obstinately resentful: and the fact that he had caught him in his own office at an unusual hour, about to indulge his notorious appetite for drink, was in itself an unhappy circumstance. The bottle and the glass were, to say the least, an unfortunate background for reunion. Paddock touched Wayne’s knee lightly; he wished to regain the ground he had lost by his frankness, which had so signally failed of response. “You have certainly deviated considerably,” remarked Wayne without humour. “I believe they call your kind of thing Christian sociology, and it’s all right. I congratulate you on having struck something interesting in this life. It’s more than I’ve been able to do. Your story is romantic and beautiful; mine had better not be told, Jimmy. I’m as bad as they’re made; I’ve hit the bottom hard. When you came in I had just reached an important conclusion, and was going to empty a quart to celebrate the event.”