father's genius intuitively, and human enough to resent the injustice of
his fate.

Douglas's mother had suffered so much because of the impractical efforts
of her husband, that she discouraged the early tendencies of the son
toward drawing and mathematics and tried to direct his thoughts toward
creeds and Bible history. When he went away for his collegiate course,
she was less in touch with him; and he was able to steal time from his
athletics to devote to his art. He spent his vacations in a neighbouring
city before a drawing board in the office of a distinguished architect,
his father's friend.

Douglas was not a brilliant divinity student, and he was relieved when
at last he received his degree in theology and found himself appointed
to a small church in the Middle West.

His step was very bright the morning he first went up the path that
led to his new home. His artistic sense was charmed by the picturesque
approach to the church and parsonage. The view toward the tree-encircled
spire was unobstructed, for the church had been built on the outskirts
of the town to allow for a growth that had not materialised. He threw
up his head and gazed at the blue hills, with their background of soft,
slow-moving clouds. The smell of the fresh earth, the bursting of the
buds, the forming of new life, set him thrilling with a joy that was
very near to pain.

He stopped half way up the path and considered the advantages of a new
front to the narrow-eaved cottage, and when his foot touched the first
step of the vine-covered porch, he was far more concerned about a new
portico than with any thought of his first sermon.

His speculations were abruptly cut short by Mandy, who bustled out
of the door with a wide smile of welcome on her black face, and an
unmistakable ambition to take him immediately under her motherly wing.
She was much concerned because the church people had not met the new
pastor at the station and brought him to the house. Upon learning that
Douglas had purposely avoided their escort, preferring to come to his
new home the first time alone, she made up her mind that she was going
to like him.

Mandy had long been a fixture in the parsonage. She and her worse half,
Hasty Jones, had come to know and discuss the weaknesses of the many
clergymen who had come and gone, the deacons, and the congregation, both
individually and collectively. She confided to Hasty, that she "didn't
blame de new parson fer not wantin'