Aylmer Silton.

This expression of fatherly interest made Mark anxious to show his appreciation of it, and whatever he had thought of St. Luke’s, Galton, or of its incumbent he would have done his best to secure the title merely to please the Bishop.  Moreover, his money was coming to an end, and another year at the Theological College would have compelled him to borrow from Mr. Ogilvie, a step which he was most anxious to avoid.  He found that Galton, which he remembered from the days when he had sent Cyril Pomeroy there to be met by Dorward, was a small county town of some eight or nine thousand inhabitants and that St. Luke’s was a new church which had originally been a chapel of ease to the parish church, but which had acquired with the growth of a poor population on the outskirts of the town an independent parochial status of its own.  The Reverend Arnold Shuter, who was the first vicar, was at first glance just a nervous bearded man, though Mark soon discovered that he possessed a great deal of spiritual force.  He was a widower and lived in the care of a housekeeper who regarded religion as the curse of good cooking.  Latterly he had suffered from acute neurasthenia, and three or four of his wealthier parishioners—­they were only relatively wealthy—­had clubbed together to guarantee the stipend of a curate.  Mark was to live at the Vicarage, a detached villa, with pointed windows and a front door like a lychgate, which gave the impression of having been built with what material was left over from building the church.

“You may think that there is not much to do in Galton,” said Mr. Shuter when he and Mark were sitting in his study after a round of the parish.

“I hope I didn’t suggest that,” Mark said quickly.

The Vicar tugged nervously at his beard and blinked at his prospective curate from pale blue eyes.

“You seem so full of life and energy,” he went on, half to himself, as though he were wondering if the company of this tall, bright-eyed, hatchet-faced young man might not prove too bracing for his worn-out nerves.

“Indeed I’m glad I do strike you that way,” Mark laughed.  “After dreaming at Silchester I’d begun to wonder if I hadn’t grown rather too much into a type of that sedate and sleepy city.”

“But there is plenty of work,” Mr. Shuter insisted.  “We have the hop-pickers at the end of the summer, and I’ve tried to run a mission for them.  Out in the hop-gardens, you know.  And then there’s Oaktown.”

“Oaktown?” Mark echoed.

“Yes.  A queer collection of people who have settled on a derelict farm that was bought up and sold in small plots by a land-speculator.  They’ll give plenty of scope for your activity.  By the way, I hope you’re not too extreme.  We have to go very slowly here.  I manage an early Eucharist every Sunday and Thursday, and of course on Saints’ days; but the attendance is not good.  We have vestments during the week, but not at the mid-day Celebration.”