Composed as the Warden was, he looked at Bingham with something of eager attention on his face, as if relying on him for support and conversation. "Poor old Boreham, he is a connection of mine by marriage," he said, and as the words fell from his lips, he, in his present sensitive mood, recoiled from them, for they implied that Boreham was not a friend. Why was he posing as one who was too superior to choose Boreham as a friend? "Talking of chaplains," said Bingham, who knew nothing of what was going on in the Warden's mind, and thought this sudden stop came from dislike of any reference to Boreham--"talking of parsons, why not release all parsons in West End churches for the war?" A smile came into May's face at the extreme sweetness of Bingham's voice; a warning that he was about to say something biting. "Release all parsons who have smart congregations," continued Bingham, in honied tones; "parsons with congregations of jolly, well-dressed women, women who enjoy having their naughtiness slanged from the pulpit just as they enjoy having their photographs in the picture papers. Their spiritual necessities would be more than adequately provided for if they were given a dummy priest and a gramophone." May's smile seemed to stimulate Bingham's imagination. "To waste on them a real parson with a soul and a rudimentary intellect," he went on, "is like giving a glass of Moselle to an agricultural labourer when he would be happy with a mug of beer. But the Church wastes its energies even in this time of heartbreakings." "I should like to see you, Bingham," said the Warden, smiling too, and turning his narrow eyes, in his slow deliberate manner, towards his guest, "as chairman to a committee of English bishops, on the Reconstruction of the Church."