nder if Hodder really knows what he's up against." Mr. Plimpton
sometimes took refuge in slang.

"Well, after all, we're not sure yet that he's 'up against anything,'"
replied Langmaid, who thought the time had come for comfort. "It may
all be a false alarm. There's no reason, after all, why a Christian
clergyman shouldn't rescue women in Dalton Street, and remain in the
city to study the conditions of the neighbourhood where his settlement
house is to be. And just, because you or I would not be able to resist
an invitation to go yachting with Eldon Parr, a man might be imagined
who had that amount of moral courage."

"That's just it. Hodder seems to me, now I come to think of it, just
the kind of John Brown type who wouldn't hesitate to get into a row
with Eldon Parr if he thought it was right, and pull down any amount of
disagreeable stuff about our ears."

"You're mixing your heroes, Wallis," said Langmaid.

"I can't help it. You'd catch it, too, Nelson. What in the name of sense
possessed you to get such a man?"

This being a question the lawyer was unable to answer, the conversation
came to another pause. And it was then that Mr. Plimpton's natural
optimism reasserted itself.

"It isn't done,--the thing we're afraid of, that's all," he proclaimed,
after a turn or two about the room. "Hodder's a gentleman, as I said,
and if he feels as we suspect he does he'll resign like a gentleman and
a Christian. I'll have a talk with him--oh, you can trust me! I've got
an idea. Gordon Atterbury told me the other day there is a vacancy in a
missionary diocese out west, and that Hodder's name had been mentioned,
among others, to the bishops for the place. He'd make a rattling
missionary bishop, you know, holding services in saloons and knocking
men's heads together for profanity, and he boxes like a professional.
Now, a word from Eldon Parr might turn the trick. Every parson wants to
be a bishop."

Langmaid shook his head.

"You're getting out of your depths, my friend. The Church isn't
Wall Street. And missionary bishops aren't chosen to make convenient
vacancies."

"I don't mean anything crude," Mr. Plimpton protested. "But a word
from the chief layman of a diocese like this, a man who never misses
a General Convention, and does everything handsomely, might
count,--particularly if they're already thinking of Hodder. The bishops
would never suspect we wanted to get rid of him."

"Well," said Langmaid, "I advise you