ys will be."

Commencement over, and the intervening summer, Scott Brenton set
himself to work to try to prove the falsity of Opdyke's words, by way
of the divinity school. Moreover, as in the case of Opdyke, although in
a wholly different sense, the parental plans for Scott had slipped a
cog. He also left the university behind him, and went elsewhere in
search of his professional degree. The change of plan, however, did not
achieve itself without some tears and many lamentations upon the part
of Mrs. Brenton. In carrying out her wishes that Scott should preach
the gospel to the heathen, it never had occurred to her that he could
preach any but the most azure forms of ultra-Calvinism. A sudden fading
in the dye of his theology well-nigh destroyed all of her pleasure in
his preaching.

The change in tint had come, to all appearing, during the summer that
had followed his bachelor's degree. How far, however, the stability of
the dyes had been affected by Scott's previous experiments in Professor
Mansfield's laboratory, it would be hard to say. It is quite within the
limits of scientific possibility that certain chemical changes might
have been taking place for many months, changes so slight and so slow
as to have escaped the notice of Scott or any of his friends who
chanced to feel an interest in the soundness of his theology. Doubtless
the change was there, potential, its elements held in suspension and
only waiting for the final molecule to arrive and start precipitation.

The molecule arrived, that summer, in the person of a curly-haired
young expounder of the Nicene Creed who came to spend July and August
at the mountain inn where Scott, after the fashion of needy students
New England over, was alternately engaged in keeping the books and
sorting up the mail. It was by way of this latter function that Scott
first came to be on speaking terms with the youthful rector of
Saint-Luke-the-Good-Physician's. And the rector, despite his four
hyphens and the gold cross that dangled on the front of his
ecclesiastical waistcoat, was an honest, unspoiled boy who was quick to
realize the curious appeal in the loneliness of Scott, to realize it
and to answer to it.

The early steps of their acquaintance were limited to the daily handing
out the letters, the daily thankful accepting them. Then, one morning,
Scott so far forgot his official and personal manners as to comment
upon the familiar imprint of one of the envelopes, as i