"Well," declared Mr. Plimpton, after a scarcely perceptible pause, "I've
no doubt they'll be worth listening to. If I were to make a guess," he
continued, with a contemplative smile, blowing a thin stream of smoke
towards the distant ceiling, "I should bet that you have spent your
summer looking over the ground. I don't say that you have missed your
vocation, Mr. Hodder, but I don't mind telling you that for a clergyman,
for a man absorbed in spiritual matters, a man who can preach the sermons
you preach, you've got more common-sense and business thoroughness than
any one I have ever run across in your profession."

"Looking over the ground?" Hodder repeated, ignoring the compliment.

"Sure," said Mr. Plimpton, smiling more benignly than ever. "You mustn't
be modest about it. Dalton Street. And when that settlement house is
built, I'll guarantee it will be run on a business basis. No nonsense."

"What do you mean by nonsense?" Hodder asked. He did not make the
question abrupt, and there was even the hint of a smile in his eyes,
which Mr. Plimpton found the more disquieting.

"Why, that's only a form of speech. I mean you'll be practical,
efficient, that you'll get hold of the people of that neighbourhood and
make 'em see that the world isn't such a bad place after all, make 'em
realize that we in St. John's want to help 'em out. That you won't make
them more foolishly discontented than they are, and go preaching
socialism to them."

"I have no intention of preaching socialism," said Hodder. But he laid a
slight emphasis on the word which sent a cold shiver down Mr. Plimpton's
spine, and made him wonder whether there might not be something worse