Gradually, almost imperceptibly, he found himself turning more and more towards that line of least resistance which other churches were following, as the one Modern Solution,—­institutional work.  After all, in the rescuing of bodies some method might yet be discovered to revive the souls.  And there were the children!  Hodder might have been likened to an explorer, seeking a direct path when there was none—­a royal road.  And if this were oblique it offered, at least, a definite outlet for his energy.

Such was, approximately, the state of his mind early in March when Gordon Atterbury came back from a conference in New York on institutional work, and filled with enthusiasm.  St. John’s was incredibly behind the times, so he told Hodder, and later the vestry.  Now that they had, in Mr. Hodder, a man of action and ability—­ahem! there was no excuse for a parish as wealthy as St. John’s, a parish with their opportunities, considering the proximity of Dalton Street neighbourhood, not enlarging and modernizing the parish house, not building a settlement house with kindergartens, schools, workshops, libraries, a dispensary and day nurseries.  It would undoubtedly be an expense—­and Mr. Atterbury looked at Mr. Parr, who drummed on the vestry table.  They would need extra assistants, deaconesses, trained nurses, and all that.  But there were other churches in the city that were ahead of St. John’s—­a reproach —­ahem!

Mr. Parr replied that he had told the rector that he stood ready to contribute to such a scheme when he, the rector; should be ready to approve it.  And he looked at Mr. Hodder.

Mr. Hodder said he had been considering the matter ever since his arrival.  He had only one criticism of institutional work, that in his observation it did not bring the people whom it reached into the Church in any great numbers.  Perhaps that were too much to ask, in these days.  For his part he would willingly assume the extra burden, and he was far from denying the positive good such work accomplished through association and by the raising of standards.

Mr. Ferguson declared his readiness to help.  Many of his salesgirls, he said, lived in this part of the city, and he would be glad to do anything in his power towards keeping them out of the dance-halls and such places.

A committee was finally appointed consisting of Mr. Parr, Mr. Atterbury, and the rector, to consult architects and to decide upon a site.

Hodder began a correspondence with experts in other cities, collected plans, pamphlets, statistics; spent hours with the great child-specialist, Dr. Jarvis, and with certain clergymen who believed in institutionalism as the hope of the future.

But McCrae was provokingly non-committal.

“Oh, they may try it,” he assented somewhat grudgingly, one day when the rector had laid out for his inspection the architects’ sketch for the settlement house.  “No doubt it will help many poor bodies along.”