The curious thing was that he did not resent his failure.  Alice had taken it hard, but he himself was conscious of a sense of spiritual gain.  The influence of the Conference, with its songs and seasons of prayer and high pressure of emotional excitement, was still strong upon him.  It seemed years and years since the religious side of him had been so stirred into motion.  He felt, as he lay back in the chair, and folded his hands over the book on his knee, that he had indeed come forth from the fire purified and strengthened.  The ministry to souls diseased beckoned him with a new and urgent significance.  He smiled to remember that Mr. Beekman, speaking in his shrewd and pointed way, had asked him whether, looking it all over, he didn’t think it would be better for him to study law, with a view to sliding out of the ministry when a good chance offered.  It amazed him now to recall that he had taken this hint seriously, and even gone to the length of finding out what books law-students began upon.

Thank God! all that was past and gone now.  The Call sounded, resonant and imperative, in his ears, and there was no impulse of his heart, no fibre of his being, which did not stir in devout response.  He closed his eyes, to be the more wholly alone with the Spirit, that moved him.

The jangling of a bell in the hallway broke sharply upon his meditations, and on the instant his wife thrust in her head from the kitchen.

“You’ll have to go to the door, Theron!” she warned him, in a loud, swift whisper.  “I’m not fit to be seen.  It is the trustees.”

“All right,” he said, and rose slowly from sprawling recumbency to his feet.  “I’ll go.”

“And don’t forget,” she added strenuously; “I believe in Levi Gorringe!  I’ve seen him go past here with his rod and fish-basket twice in eight days, and that’s a good sign.  He’s got a soft side somewhere.  And just keep a stiff upper lip about the gas, and don’t you let them jew you down a solitary cent on that sidewalk.”

“All right,” said Theron, again, and moved reluctantly toward the hall door.

CHAPTER III

When the three trustees had been shown in by the Rev. Mr. Ware, and had taken seats, an awkward little pause ensued.  The young minister looked doubtingly from one face to another, the while they glanced with inquiring interest about the room, noting the pictures and appraising the furniture in their minds.

The obvious leader of the party, Loren Pierce, a rich quarryman, was an old man of medium size and mean attire, with a square, beardless face as hard and impassive in expression as one of his blocks of limestone.  The irregular, thin-lipped mouth, slightly sunken, and shut with vice-like firmness, the short snub nose, and the little eyes squinting from half-closed lids beneath slightly marked brows, seemed scarcely to attain to the dignity of features, but evaded attention