“Do you mean Billy McNeil, over on Sinsiniwa Creek?” broke in Herndon.

“I think quite likely, uncle; would n’t he make a splendid addition to Mr. Wynkoop’s church?”

Herndon choked, his entire body shaking with ill-suppressed enjoyment.  “I should imagine yes,” he admitted finally.  “Billy McNeil—­oh, Lord!  There ’s certainly a fine opening for you to do some missionary work, Phoebe.”

“Well, and I ’m going to,” announced the young lady, firmly.  “I guess I can read men’s characters, and I know all Mr. McNeil needs is to have some one show an interest in him.  Have you a large church, Mr. Wynkoop?”

“Not large if judged from an Eastern standpoint,” he confessed, with some regret.  “Our present membership is composed of eight women and three men, but the congregational attendance is quite good, and constantly increasing.”

“Only eight women and three men!” breathlessly.  “And you have been laboring upon this field for five years!  How could it be so small?”

Wynkoop pushed back his chair, anxious to redeem himself in the estimation of this fair stranger.

“Miss Spencer,” he explained, “it is perhaps hardly strange that you should misapprehend the peculiar conditions under which religious labor is conducted in the West.  You will undoubtedly understand all this better presently.  My parish comprises this entire mining region, and I am upon horseback among the foothills and up in the ranges for fully a third of my time.  The spirit of the mining population, as well as of the cattlemen, while not actually hostile, is one of indifference to religious thought.  They care nothing whatever for it in the abstract, and have no use for any minister, unless it may be to marry their children or bury their dead.  I am hence obliged to meet with them merely as man to man, and thus slowly win their confidence before I dare even approach a religious topic.  For three long years I worked here without even a church organization or a building; and apparently without the faintest encouragement.  Now that we have a nucleus gathered, a comfortable building erected and paid for, with an increasing congregation, I begin to feel that those seemingly barren five years were not without spiritual value.”

She quickly extended her hands.  “Oh, it is so heroic, so self-sacrificing!  No doubt I was hasty and wrong.  But I have always been accustomed to so much larger churches.  I am going to help you, Mr. Wynkoop, in every way I possibly can—­I shall certainly speak to both Mr. Moffat and Mr. McNeil the very first opportunity.  I feel almost sure that they will join.”

The unavoidable exigencies of a choir practice compelled Mr. Wynkoop to retire early, nor was it yet late when the more intimate family circle also dissolved, and the two girls discovered themselves alone.  Naida drew down the shades and lit the lamp.  Miss Spencer slowly divested herself of her outer dress, replacing it with a light wrapper, encased her feet snugly in comfortable slippers, and proceeded to let down her flossy hair in gleaming waves across her shoulders.  Naida’s dark eyes bespoke plainly her admiration, and Miss Spencer shook back her hair somewhat coquettishly.