"Zed like the Church all over, Pazon!" chuckled the imperturbable Joltram. "Zeems as if I 'erd the 'Glory be'! But if tha don't want any talk, why does tha coom in 'ere wheer we'se all a-drinkin' steady and talkin' 'arty, an' no quarrellin' nor backbitin' of our neighbours? Tha wants us to go 'ome,--why doezn't tha go 'ome thysen? Tha's a wife a zettin' oop there, an' m'appen she's waitin' with as fine a zermon as iver was preached from a temperance cart in a wasterne field!" He laughed again; Arbroath turned his back upon him in disgust, and strode up to the shadowed corner where Helmsley sat watching the little scene. "Now, my man, who are _you_?" demanded the clergyman imperiously. "Where do you come from?" Matt Peke would have spoken, but Helmsley silenced him by a look and rose to his feet, standing humbly with bent head before his arrogant interlocutor. There were the elements of comedy in the situation, and he was inclined to play his part thoroughly. "From Bristol," he replied. "What are you doing here?" "Getting rest, food, and a night's lodging." "Why do you leave out drink in the list?" sneered Arbroath. "For, of course, it's your special craving! Where are you going?" "To Cornwall." "Tramping it?" "Yes." "Begging, I suppose?" "Sometimes." "Disgraceful!" And the reverend gentleman snorted offence like a walrus rising from deep waters. "Why don't you work?" "I'm too old." "Too old! Too lazy you mean! How old are you?" "Seventy." Mr. Arbroath paused, slightly disconcerted. He had entered the "Trusty Man" in the hope of discovering some or even all of its customers in a state of drunkenness. To his disappointment he had found them perfectly sober. He had pounced on the stray man whom he saw was a stranger, in the expectation of proving him, at least, to be intoxicated. Here again he was mistaken. Helmsley's simple straight answers left him no opening for attack. "You'd better make for the nearest workhouse," he said, at last. "Tramps are not encouraged on these roads." "Evidently not!" And Helmsley raised his calm eyes and fixed them on the clergyman's lowering countenance with a faintly satiric smile. "You're not too old to be impudent, I see!" retorted Arbroath, with an unpleasant contortion of his features. "I warn you not to come cadging about anywhere in this neighbourhood, for if you do I shall give you in charge. I have four parishes under my control, and I make it a rule to hand all beggars over to the police." "That's not very good Christianity, is it?" asked Helmsley quietly. Matt Peke chuckled. The Reverend Mr. Arbroath started indignantly, and stared so hard that his rat-brown eyes visibly projected from his head. "Not very good Christianity!" he echoed. "What--what do you mean? How dare you speak to me about Christianity!"