'Well?—the conclusion?'
'How can you ask? Some things are self-evident.'
'What do you think that means: "He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none"?'
'I don't think it means that,' said Betty. 'That you are to give away all you have, till you haven't left yourself an overcoat.'
'Are you sure? Not if somebody else needed it more? That is the question. We come back to the—"Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you." "Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils." How, do you think, can I best do that in the case of Mrs. Mills and her boy? One thing at a time. Never mind what the Duke of Trefoil may complicate in the future.'
'Raise the dead!' Betty echoed.
'Ay,' he said. 'There are worse deaths than that of the body.'
Betty paused, but Pitt waited.
'If they are to be kept alive in any sense,' she said at last, 'they must be taken out of that hole where they are now.'
'And, as you truly suggest that the number of persons wanting such relief is unlimited, the first thing to be done is to build proper houses for the poor. That is what I have set about.'