“I want to read you something I’ve brought from the office,” Dicky said. “I’m not saying a word--until afterward.” It was a little story called _Dr. Filter_, by an unknown young man, named Rufus Melton. It had come to _The Public Square_ among the unsolicited manuscripts. Pidge listened with extraordinary restlessness. She seemed to know so much about this story, its processes and the thing it told, that her mind was unpleasantly crowded. It wasn’t a matter of like or dislike. _Dr. Filter_ was here in the world, a live thing. It had to be met and dealt with. “Not more than once a year, one comes in as live as this,” Dicky said. “Yet it’s like something from a different world from Nagar’s Little Man story.” “It isn’t whether you like _Dr. Filter_, or not, but you can’t get away from it--like a relative who comes to live in your house,” said Pidge. “That’s a center shot,” Dicky thoughtfully remarked. She found herself asking about Rufus Melton. Dicky didn’t know much, but was intensely pleased over her reaction to his latest artistic find.... Pidge never lacked opinions, even verdicts, nor the energy to express them when Dicky was around. They forgot Rufus Melton, and out-generaled time in discussing Miss Claes. “Every little while as she talks, I feel as if I were going through a tunnel,” he said. “Of course, I admire her, and all that, but sometimes I can’t help asking myself, like the others, if she is really right----” “The more ignorant one is, the more crazy he thinks Miss Claes,” Pidge observed. “Another bull’s-eye. Wait till I set up the target again, Pidge. But is it because she’s Hindu--that she’s so different?” “She isn’t Hindu. She’s English.” “I asked her.” “So did I.” “She’ll have to referee this herself,” Dicky hastily put in. Then they were silent awhile, until Pidge said: “Maybe I heard her wrong. I’m sure she’s had a lot of Hindu training. But that’s not what draws me to her. It’s because she’s not taking it out in talk. She knows about plumbing and cooking and streets and common things. Best of all, she pays her bills!” But Dicky, who had never known other than financial ease and financial integrity, was more interested in the other side of their landlady. “Can one get books--on her sort of thing?” he asked. “You’re always getting me into this lately,” Pidge complained. “I don’t like to talk about it. I floated up through zones of Hindu stuff from a child. Better leave it alone, Dicky. Stay in your head--stay down.” “What do you mean, ‘Stay in your head,’ please?”