“It doesn’t matter what T. E. Valley does,” he began again, his voice rising to a shrill squeal, like the voice of a prophet among mice. “It doesn’t matter whether I drink or whether I stay sober! The blessed Sacrament remains the same, whatever happens to T. E. Valley!”

Wolf looked at him and exulted in the man’s exultation. “He’s got hold of it,” he thought, “whatever he likes to call it. He’s got hold of it. This awful house might be a prison, an asylum, a slave-galley. The fellow’s a saint! He’s got hold of it!”

But it was his practical reason rather than his nervous sympathy that dictated his next words. “You don’t worry yourself about conduct, then, or about duty?”

The little man’s disordered El Greco eyes grew bright within their hollow sockets. “Not a bit!” he cried. “Not a bit!”