"Oxford?" he ventured.
"Yes, Brasenose. Are you a college man, too?"
"Dublin," said the barrister. "I was a novelist."
"I was a curate; I used to preach about the Day of Judgment—but d'you know, it's quite different. The canonists never suggested that it would last so long, but it's extremely interesting, and I'm planning a work on contemporary Eschatology."
"Judgment be blowed," the barrister snorted, "it's the usual cause and effect, machinery broken down—passengers hungry. I'm beastly pinched."
"Are you really?" The curate still had a trace of his pulpit manner. "Now that is most curious. My hunger has gone away quite, but if my mind seems to wander pray correct me. Am I talking nonsense now?"
"No; what was your last meal?"
"A portion of rat," said the parson, smiling at the pleasant suggestion of memory. "But my landlady has taken to improper courses, led away, poor thing, by her daughter. She has joined one of the cannibal clubs. I felt that she was becoming untrustworthy, and withdrew to the streets."
The barrister laughed wearily. "My wife and children—" he said; "I shot them last night—well—who cares?"
"How shocking," said the curate. "Hope," he continued, "is dead, and our prayers break upon the brazen echoing heavens. Who would have supposed that the world would die so hard?"