Lounging in the City Club one day after lunch, with every other subject of common interest at least touched on, Brother Albert turned to Brother Walter:  “And how goes the church and parish of Delafield?  You told me long ago that you wanted to stay there ten years; it’s more than eight now.  Does the ten-year mark yet stand?”

“Yes, Al., it still stands, if nothing should interfere,” said Walter.  He had never told his brother the reason back of that ten-year mark, and he was not ready, even yet, for that.  Of late he had taken to wondering when and how the Experiment would come to its crisis.  He wanted some help just now, and here might be an opening.  So he went on, “I’ve been working away at several special jobs, as you know I like to do, and one of them has a good deal to do with a young fellow named Farwell, John Wesley Farwell, Jr., who’ll be the mainstay of the best hardware store in Delafield before long if he sticks to it.  Everybody calls him ‘J.W.,’ and he’s the sort of boy that has always interested me, he’s so ‘average,’” He paused; his thoughts busy with the Experiment.

“Well,” his brother broke in, after a moment, “what’s this young John Wesley Methodist been doing?”

“It isn’t altogether what he has been doing, but it’s what I’d like to see him get a chance to do,” explained the preacher.  “He’s tied to the store and to Delafield, so far, and I’ve reasons for wanting him to see some parts of this country he’ll never see from Main Street in our town.”

“Well, brother mine, maybe he could be induced to leave that particular Main Street.  There’s where we get the best citizens of this village.  Has he any objections to making a change—­to travel, for instance?”

“I don’t know,” said Walter; “probably not.  He’s young, and has a pretty good education.  I do know that he’s ambitious to make himself the best hardware man in our section, and I believe he’ll do it, in time.  Personally, I want him to travel.  But how would anybody go about getting him the chance?”

Albert Drury laughed.  “That’s easy, only a preacher couldn’t be expected to see it.  If any country boy really knows the stuff he handles, whether it is hardware or candy or hides, he can get the chance all right.  This town wants him.  Don’t you know that the big wholesale houses recruit their sales forces by spotting just such boys as your John Wesley Farwell may be?  But what do you mean by calling him average, if he’s such a keen judge of hardware?”

“Oh, well, he is more than average on hardware, but he’s so beautifully average human; one of those chaps who do most of the real work of the world.”

“All right, old man; I’m not sure that I follow you; but, anyway, I may be of some use.  I’ll tell you what I’ll do; I know the very man.  Peter McDougall, who’s a friend I can bank on, is sales manager of the Cummings Hardware Corporation.  Nothing will come of it if Peter is not impressed, but all I need to do is to tell him there’s a prospective star salesman up at Delafield, and his man who has that territory will be looking up your John Wesley before you have time to write another sermon.  By the way,” he added, “what part of the country did you say you wanted young Farwell to see?”