"Well, I don't know. He works night and day over these people—and he knows how to deal with them. Leave it to the Bowery or to the ladies in his congregation, and he might turn this government into a despotism without a single dissenting vote."
"I believe you're right. By the way, you know he gave me that portrait of Father Speares to do for the church."
"Glad to hear it. But I never understood his conversion, somehow."
"Oh, I don't know. Men change like that every day."
"But not for logic. I say, it happened shortly after Mariana left, didn't it?"
"Heard anything of her?"
Nevins shook his head.
"Only what you know already," he answered.
"Deuced little, then."