on Holy Writ. “You whited sepulchre!” he bellowed, with a final shake, and cast Whiskers-on-the- moon from him with a vigor which impelled that unhappy pacifist to the very verge of the choir entrance door. Mr. Pryor’s once ruddy face was ashen. But he turned at bay. “I’ll have the law on you for this,” he gasped.
“Do—do,” roared Norman, making another rush. But Mr. Pryor was gone. He had no desire to fall a second time into the hands of an avenging militarist. Norman turned to the platform for one graceless, triumphant moment.
“Don’t look so flabbergasted, parsons,” he boomed. “You couldn’t do it— nobody would expect it of the cloth—but somebody had to do it. You know you're glad I threw him out,—he couldn't be let go on yammering and yodelling and yawping sedition and treason. Sedition and treason—somebody had to deal with it. I was born for this hour—I’ve had my innings in church at last. I can sit quiet for another sixty years now! Go ahead with your meeting, parsons. I reckon you won't be troubled with any more pacifist prayers.”
But the spirit of devotion and reverence had fled. Both ministers realized it and realized that the only thing to do was to close the meeting quietly and let the excited people go. Mr. Meredith addressed a few earnest words to the boys in khaki—which probably saved Mr. Pryor’s windows from a second onslaught—and Mr. Arnold pronounced an incongruous benediction—at least, he felt it was incongruous, for he could not at once banish from his memory the sight of gigantic Norman Douglas shaking the fat, pompous
