rprised
myself that Octavius doesn't love us, or look to us for intellectual
stimulation. I myself leave that pulpit more often than otherwise
feeling like a wet rag--utterly limp and discouraged. But, if you don't
mind my speaking of it, YOU don't belong, and yet YOU come."

It was evident that the lawyer did not mind. He spoke freely in reply.
"Oh, yes, I've got into the habit of it. I began going when I first came
here, and--and so it grew to be natural for me to go. Then, of course,
being the only lawyer you have, a considerable amount of my business is
mixed up in one way or another with your membership; you see those are
really the things which settle a man in a rut, and keep him there."

"I suppose your people were Methodists," said Theron, to fill in the
pause, "and that is how you originally started with us."

Levi Gorringe shook his head. He leaned back, half closed his eyes,
put his finger-tips together, and almost smiled as if something in
retrospect pleased and moved him.

"No," he said; "I went to the church first to see a girl who used to
go there. It was long before your time. All her family moved away years
ago. You wouldn't know any of them. I was younger then, and I didn't
know as much as I do now. I worshipped the very ground that girl walked
on, and like a fool I never gave her so much as a hint of it. Looking
back now, I can see that I might have had her if I'd asked her. But
I went instead and sat around and looked at her at church and
Sunday-school and prayer-meetings Thursday nights, and class-meetings
after the sermon. She was devoted to religion and church work; and,
thinking it would please her, I joined the church on probation. Men can
fool themselves easier than they can other people. I actually believed
at the time that I had experienced religion. I felt myself full of all
sorts of awakenings of the soul and so forth. But it was really that
girl. You see I'm telling you the thing just as it was. I was very
happy. I think it was the happiest time of my life. I remember there was
a love-feast while I was on probation; and I sat down in front, right
beside her, and we ate the little square chunks of bread and drank the
water together, and I held one corner of her hymn-book when we stood up
and sang. That was the nearest I ever got to her, or to full membership
in the church. That very next week, I think it was, we learned that she
had got engaged to the minister's son--a young man who had