“Thank you! There’s some consolation in that!” Mills laughed. “But if we really took the teachings of Jesus literally we wouldn’t be sitting here; we’d be out looking up people who need shelter, food, cheer. As it is I’m not bothering my head about them. I pay others to do that—Carroll hands me a list of organizations he considers worthy of assistance and all I do is to sign the checks—ought to be ashamed of myself, oughtn’t I?”
“Well, now, Mills,” Lindley laughed pleasantly, “that’s a matter I leave to your own conscience.”
“But you oughtn’t to! It’s your duty to tell me that instead of riding up to a comfortable club today to eat luncheon with a couple of bankers I ought first to be sure that every man, woman and child in the community is clothed and fed and happy.”
“What would you do if I did?” Lindley demanded, bending forward and regarding Mills fixedly.
“I’d tell you to go to the Devil!”
“There you are!” cried Lindley with a gesture of resignation. “You know your duty to your neighbor as well as I do. The affair isn’t between you and me, after all, my dear friend—it’s between you and God!”
“God?” Mills repeated the word soberly, his eyes turning to the window and the picture it framed, of a sky blurred by the smoke of factory chimneys. “I wonder——” he added, half to himself.
Lindley was puzzled and embarrassed, uncertain whether to try to explain himself further. His intuitions were keen and in his attempt to adjust himself to a new phase of Mills’s character he groped for an explanation of the man’s surprising utterances. There had been something a little wistful in Mills’s use of the word God. Lindley was sincerely eager to help where help was needed, but as he debated whether Mills really had disclosed any need that he could satisfy, Mills ended the matter by saying a little wearily:
“What was it you wanted to see me about, Lindley?”
“It’s about the Mills memorial window in St. Barnabas; the transept wall’s settled lately and pulled the window out of plumb. Some of the panels are loose. The excavations for the new building across the alley caused the disturbance. Now that the building’s up we’ll hope the worst is over. That’s one of the finest windows in the West. The figure of our Lord feeding the multitude is beautifully conceived. I had Freeman look at it and he says we’ll have to get an expert out from New York to take care of it properly. The vestry’s hard up as usual, but I felt sure you’d want us to have the job well done——”