"Help me with these schemes of yours for the happiness of my people and I will give you back your wife." But the reflection would come: Why should an omnipotent God trouble Himself to bargain with His creatures, take round-about ways for accomplishing what could be done at once by a movement of His will? A God who could have made all things perfect from the beginning, beyond the need of either growth or change. Who had chosen instead to write the history of the human race in blood and tears. Surely such a God would need man's forgiveness, not his worship. The unknown God was yet to seek.
Landripp had been killed during the building of the model dwellings. It had been his own fault. For a stout, elderly gentleman to run up and down swaying ladders, to scramble round chimney stacks, and balance himself on bending planks a hundred feet above the ground was absurd. There were younger men who could have done all that, who warned Mr. Landripp of the risks that he was running. He had insisted on supervising everything himself. The work from its commencement had been to him a labour of love. He was fearful lest a brick should be ill-laid.
Anthony had a curious feeling of annoyance as he looked upon the bruised and broken heap of
