you," said Nan, as she looked up at the rector
from under the wide brim of her hat. "Our engagement is to be announced
Wednesday."

Hodder congratulated them. There was a brief silence, when Nan said
tremulously:

"We're coming to St. John's!"

"I'm very glad," Hodder replied, gravely. It was one of those
compensating moments, for him, when his tribulations vanished; and the
tributes of the younger generation were those to which his heart most
freely responded. But the situation, in view of the attitude of Francis
Ferguson, was too delicate to be dwelt upon.

"I came to hear you last Sunday, Mr. Hodder," the young man volunteered,
with that mixture of awkwardness and straightforwardness which often
characterize his sex and age in referring to such matters. "And I had
an idea of writing you, too, to tell you how much I liked what you said.
But I know you must have had many letters. You've made me think."

He flushed, but met the rector's eye. Nan stood regarding him with
pride.

"You've made me think, too," she added. "And we intend to pitch in and
help you, if we can be of any use."

He parted from them, wondering. And it was not until he had reached the
parish house that it occurred to him that he was as yet unenlightened as
to the young man's name . . . .

His second reflection brought back to his mind Kate Mercy, for it was
with a portion of Nan Ferguson's generous check that her board had been
paid. And he recalled the girl's hope, as she had given it to him, that
he would find some one in Dalton Street to help . . . .

II

There might, to the mundane eye, have been an element of the ridiculous
in the spectacle of the rector of St. John's counting his gains, since he
had chosen--with every indication of insanity--to bring the pillars of
his career crashing down on his own head. By no means the least,
however, of the treasures flung into his lap was the tie which now bound
him to the Philip Goodriches, which otherwise would never have been
possible. And as he made his way thither on this particular evening, a
renewed sense came upon him of his emancipation from the dreary, useless
hours he had been wont to spend at other dinner tables. That existence
appeared to him now as the glittering, feverish unreality of a nightmare
filled with restless women and tired men who drank champagne, thus
gradually achieving--by the time cigars were reached--an artificial
vivacity. The caprice and superficiality of t