r, and by
the fireplace in the Shenk living room, and around the farm, they
considered many things, some of them not so personal as others. J.W.
told the story of his life in Saint Louis and on the road; Jeannette
listening like another Desdemona to the recital. And once again it was
not the adventure which supplied the thrill, but the adventurer.

And Jeannette told him the news of Delafield. How Joe Carbrook and
Marcia Dayne's wedding had been the most wonderful wedding ever seen in
Delafield, with the town as proud of its one-time scapegrace as it was
of the beautiful bride. How brother Marty had been finding many excuses
of late for driving up from his circuit, and how he managed to see Alma
Wetherell a good deal. How Alma was now head bookkeeper and cashier of
the Emporium, the town's biggest store, and how she was such a dear
girl. How Pastor Drury and Marty had become great friends. How the
minister was not so well as usual, and people were getting to be a
little worried about him. How the Delafield church had taken up tithing,
and was not only doing a lot better financially, but in every other way.
How Deep Creek was going to have a new minister, a friend whom Marty had
met at the summer school for rural ministers, who would try to help the
Deep Creek people get an up-to-date church building and learn to use it.
How the Everyday Doctrines of Delafield had been first boosted and then
forgotten, and now again several of them were being practiced in some
quarters. And much more, though never to the wearing out of J.W.'s
interest. Certainly not, the news being just what he wanted to know, and
the reporter thereof being just the person he wanted to tell it to him.

One bit of news Jeannette did not tell, for the sufficient reason that
she did not know it. Pastor Drury and Brother Marty _had_ become great
friends, but what Jeannette could not tell was the special bond of
interest which was back of the fact. Marty had long been aware that for
some reason the Delafield pastor was peculiarly concerned about J.W.
Never did he guess Walter Drury's secret, but he knew well enough there
was one.

These two, the town preacher and the young circuit rider, read to each
other J.W.'s letters, and talked much about him and his experiences, and
made J.W. in general the theme of many discussions.

"It has been good for the boy that he has had that border trip," said
the pastor to Marty a few days before J.W. got back. "Don't you