good chums so far, haven't we? Well, there's
a lot to settle before I can be sure I'm a Christian, but it means
everything for you to think I can be of some use. And I promise you
this, J.W., I'll not let up until I am a Christian, and we'll stick
together all the more, when I am, us two. Is that ago?"

It was a go. J.W. was ready and far more than ready to call it a go. It
had been easier than he had expected, but then it had all been so
different from the vague and formal thing he had been afraid of. He
could hardly believe, but he had one request to make. "I know you'll
settle whatever has to be settled," he said, a bit unsteadily, "but when
it's all done, and you tell people about it, as I know you will, please,
Marty, don't bring me into it. Publicly, I mean. Let's just have this
understanding between ourselves. I can lead my meeting now, but there's
no need to say anything about me. Besides, I made a mess of it."

"It may be the best mess anybody ever stirred up for me, J.W., but I
won't say anything to worry you, if the time comes for me to say
anything at all. And I believe it will."

It did. Marty and the pastor had two or three long interviews. From the
last of them the boy came away with a new light on his face and a new
spring in his step. Evidently whatever needed to be settled, had been
settled.

He kept his promise to his chum, but that did not prevent him from
choosing the night when J.W. led the meeting to stand up at the first
opportunity and make his straightforward confession of love and loyalty,
since God had made him a sharer in the life that is in Christ. Then for
a moment J.W. feared Marty might forget their agreement, but Marty said
simply, "And part of the joy that is in my heart to-night is because
there is a new tie, the only other one we needed, between myself and my
old-time chum, the leader of this meeting."

In the back of the room Walter Drury, quietly looking on, sent up a
silent thanksgiving. The great Experiment was going well.

CHAPTER III

CAMPUS DAYS

So it was that J.W. and Marty had come into the inner places of each
other's lives. Of all the developments of Institute week, naturally the
one which filled J.W.'s thoughts with a sort of awed gladness was
Marty's decision to offer himself for the ministry. Joe Carbrook's
right-about-face was much more dramatic, for J.W. saw, when the decision
was made, that Marty could not have been meant for anything but a
preacher.