ANGEL PAVEMENT

were innumerable people in London who were not only
ready to make the acquaintance of Turgis, but were
actually longing for him. There were Park's comrades,
the communists, who would be only too glad to obtain
another recruit; possibly the Socialists; and certainly
the Anti-Socialists, who would have been delighted to
show him how to mount a soap-box. There were clergy-
men of all denomination and sects on the prowl for him,
willing to lead him in prayer, to instruct him in the
Scriptures, to teach him anthems, to show him lantern-
slides of the Norfolk Broads, to smoke a manly pipe at
him, to play a game of chess, draughts, dominoes,
bagatelle, or billiards with him, to give him a right hook
and then a straight left with the gloves on, according to
their varied tastes and dispositions. There were men
who were not clergymen, but had the habits and outlook
of clergymen, leaders of ethical societies and the like,
who would be pleased to talk to him about their own
particular universes, lend him a few books, and welcome
him twice a week at their philosophical-literary-mu&ical
services. No doubt there were criminals who could have
made good use of a youth with such a guileless air.
There were thousands of other young men in lodgings
and offices, young men who were not very clever or
strong or handsome or brave or artful, young men who
were for ever packing themselves into Tubes and buses,
eating hastily in corners of crowded teashops, and then
using the music-halls, picture theatres, saloon bars and
lighted streets as their drawing-rooms, studies, and
clubs, who would soon have been overjoyed, once the
mumbling preliminaries were passed, to spend their
evenings with Turgis.
But then he did not really want any of these people,