"As they grow older? But surely development is natural and to be
expected?"

"Certainly. But when a man changes drastically, sheds his character and
takes on another?"

"You are talking perhaps of what is called conversion?"

"Well, that would be an instance of what I mean, no doubt. But there
are changes of another type. We clergymen, you know, mix intimately with
so many men that we are almost bound to become psychologists if we are
to do any good. It becomes a habit with many of us to study closely our
fellow-men. Now I, for instance; I cannot live at close quarters with a
man without, almost unconsciously, subjecting him to a minute scrutiny,
and striving to sum him up. My curates, for example--"

"Yes?" said Malling.

"There are four of them, our friend Chichester being the senior one."

"And you have 'placed' them all?"

"I thought I had, I thought so--but--"

Mr. Harding was silent. Then, with a strange abruptness, and the air of a
man forced into an action against which something within him protested,
he said:

"Mr. Malling, you are the only person I know who, having been acquainted
with Henry Chichester, has at last met him again after a prolonged