Part 27 (1/2)

”Oh! Have you seen the Russian Ballet?”

Edward Henry had not--nor heard of it ”Why?” he asked

”Nothing,” said Mr Alloyd ”Only I saw it the night before last in Paris You never saw such dancing It's enchanted--enchanted! TheI ever saw in my life I couldn't sleep for it Not that I ever sleep very well!--I ht, as you were interested in theatres--and Midland people are so enterprising! Have a cigarette?”

Edward Henry, who had begun to feel sympathetic, was somewhat repelled by these odd last reh, was an utter stranger

”No thanks,” he said ”And so you're going to put up a church here?”

”Yes”

”Well, I wonder whether you are”

He walked abruptly away under Alloyd's riddling stare, and he could al, ”Well, he's a queer lot, if you like”

At the corner of the site, below the spot where his electric sign was to have been, he was stopped by a well-dressed ed lady who bore a bundle of papers

”Will you buy a paper for the cause?” she suggested in a pleasant, persuasive tone ”One penny”

He obeyed, and she handed him a small blue-printed periodical of which the title was ”_Azure_, the Organ of the New Thought Church” He glanced at it, puzzled, and then at the oes to the Church Building Fund,” she said, as if in defence of her action

Edward Henry burst out laughing; but it was a nervous, half-hysterical laugh that he laughed

II

In Carey Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields, he descended froe, Budge, Slosson, Maveringham, Slosson & Vulto--solicitors--known in the profession by the co been a lawyer's clerk some twenty-five years earlier, are of Slossons

Although on the strength of his youthful clerkshi+p he claie of the law--enough to silence argument when his opponent did not happen to be an actual solicitor--he did not in truth possess a very special knowledge of the la should he, seeing that he had only been a practitioner of shorthand?--but the fame of Slossons he positively was acquainted with! He had even written letters to the hty Slossons

Every lawyer and lawyer's clerk in the realreatness of Slossons, and crouched before it, and also, for the hteousness with sneers For Slossons acted for the ruling classes of England, who only get value for theirthat they can see, smell, handle, or inti, or a lackey

Slossons, those crack solicitors, like the crack nerve specialists in Harley Street and the crack fortune-tellers in Bond Street, sold their invisible, inodorous and intangible wares of advice at double, treble, or decuple their worth, according to the psychology of the custoreat money-lenders--on behalf of their wealthier clients In obedience to a convenient theory that it is i in one place, they were continually calling inthe su two bills of costs on each transaction, and so an are-insurance brokers In short, Slossons had nothing to learn about the art of self-enrichment

Three vast motor-cars waited in front of their ancient door, and Edward Henry's hired electric vehicle was di the senior partner, as denied to him by an old clerk with a face like a stone wall Only his brutal Midland insistence, and the mention of the important letter which he had written to the firno ladder of partners he clung desperately to Mr Vulto, and he saw Mr

Vulto--a youngish and sarcastic person with blue eyes, lodged in a dark room at the back of the house It occurred fortunately that his letter had been allotted to precisely Mr Vulto for the purpose of being answered

”You got my letter?” said Edward Henry, cheerfully, as he sat down at Mr Vulto's flat desk on the side opposite froot it, but frankly we cannot make head or tail of it! _What_ option?” Mr Vulto's manner was crudely sarcastic