at morning service. Shame, Elmer, wicked shame to see this great institution, meant for the quickening of such vast multitudes of souls, declining and, by thunder, not hardly giving a cent for missions! I wonder if you could revive it? Go look it over, and the neighborhood, and let me know what you think. Or whether you'd rather stay on in Sparta. You'll get less salary at Wellspring than you're getting in Sparta—four thousand, isn't it?—but if you build up the church, guess the Official Board will properly remunerate your labors."
A church in Zenith! Elmer would—almost—have taken it with no salary whatever. He could see his Doctor of Divinity degree at hand, his bishopric or college presidency or fabulous pulpit in New York.
He found the Wellspring M. E. Church a hideous graystone hulk with gravy-colored windows, and a tall spire ornamented with tin gargoyles and alternate layers of tiles in distressing red and green. The neighborhood had been smart, but the brick mansions, once leisurely among lawns and gardens, were scabrous and slovenly, turned into boarding-houses with delicatessen shops in the basements.
"Gosh, this section never will come back. Too many of the doggone hoi polloi. Bunch of Wops. Nobody for ten blocks that would put more'n ten cents in the collection. Nothing doing! I'm not going to run a soup-kitchen and tell a bunch of dirty bums to come to Jesus. Not on your life!"
But he saw, a block from the church, a new apartment-house, and near it an excavation.
"Hm. Might come back, in apartments, at that. Mustn't jump too quick. Besides, these folks need the gospel just as much as the swell-headed plutes out on Royal Ridge," reflected the Reverend Mr. Gantry.
Through his old acquaintance, Gil O'Hearn of the O'Hearn House, Elmer met a responsible contractor and inquired into the fruitfulness of the Wellspring vineyard.
"Yes, they're dead certain to build a bunch of apartment-houses, and pretty good ones, in that neighborhood these next few years. Be a big residential boom in Old Town. It's near enough in to be handy to the business section, and far enough from the Union Station so's they haven't got any warehouses or wholesalers. Good buy, Reverend."
"Oh, I'm not buying—I'm just selling—selling the gospel!"
