“This minister of the First Congregational Church of Pointview now aspired 129 to be the prime minister of its first heiress. Their acquaintance, which had begun in the arrangements for the servants’ ball, had grown in warmth and intimacy as soon as Harry had gone. Robert began to take after Marie, with muffler open and all the gas on. He was a swell of a parson––utterly damned with good-fortune. Had an income from the estate of his father, a call from on high, a crest from Charlemagne, diplomas from college and the seminary, a fine figure, red cheeks, and ‘heavenly eyes.’ As to his fatal gift of beauty, the young ladies were of one mind. They agreed, also, about the cut of his garments, that were changed several times a day.
“A dashing, masculine, head-punching spirit might have saved him with all his ballast, but he didn’t have it. The Reverend Robert was a good fellow to everybody––a fairly sound-hearted, decent, handsome fellow, but not a man. To be that, one has to know things at first 130 hand––especially work and trouble. He was a second-hand, school-made thinker. His doctrines came out of the books, but his conduct was mildly modern. He danced and smoked a little, and played bridge and golf, and made his visits in a handsome motor-car.
“Marie liked the young man, and she and her mother rode and tramped about with him almost every day of that summer. Deacon Joe showed signs of faintness when he spoke of him.
“One day I went up to the Benson homestead and found the old man sitting on his piazza alone.
“‘Where’s Marie?’ I asked.
“‘Off knocking around with the minister,’ said Deacon Joe, in a voice frail with contempt.
“‘She might be in worse company,’ I suggested.
“‘Maybe,’ he snapped.
“‘What’s the matter with the minister?’