before our present
pastor was born?"

"You say some people are going over to Fairfield?" asked J.W. "Why do
they go there, when they could go to town about as easy?"

"Well, John Wesley," Pa Shenk answered, soberly. "I think I know. But
you say you're going to spend next Sunday with Marty. From what Marty
writes I've a notion it's much the same on his work as it is at
Fairfield, except that Marty has two points. Wait till next week, and
then come back and tell us how you explain the difference between Deep
Creek Church and Ellis."

In the afternoon Jeannette and J.W. took a ride around the
neighborhood, whose every tree and culvert and rural mail-box they knew,
without in the least being tired of seeing it. Their talk was on an old,
old subject, and not remarkable, yet somehow it was more to them both
than any poet's rhapsody. And their occasional silences were no less
eloquent.

But in a more than usually prosaic moment Jeannette said, "John Wesley,
I wonder if there's any hope to get the Deep Creek young people
interested in church the way they used to be? I'm just hungry for the
sort of good times the older boys and girls used to have when you and
Marty and I were nothing but children. They enjoyed themselves, and so
did everybody else. What's the matter with so many country churches,
nowadays?"

To which question J.W. could only answer: "I don't know. I didn't
realize things were so bad here. Maybe I'll get some ideas about it next
Saturday and Sunday. Your father seems to think Marty is getting started
on the right track. And that reminds me; don't let me go away without
those books he wants, will you?"

This is not a record of that Sunday afternoon's drive, nor of the many
others which followed on other Sundays and on the days between. Some
other time there may be opportunity for the whole story of Jeannette and
J.W.

* * * * *

As J.W. drove up to Ellis Corners post office late the next Friday
afternoon Marty waylaid him and demanded to be taken aboard. "Drive a
half-mile further east," he said after their boisterous greetings.
"That's where we eat to-night--at Ambery's. Then just across the road to
the church. We've got something special on."

"A box supper," asked J.W., "or a bean-bag party?" But he knew better.

Marty told him to wait and see. Supper was a pleasant meal, the Amberys
being pleasant people, who lived in a cozy new house. But J.W. was
mystified to hea