Although David had never allowed the filmy intuition to become an actual thought, the gossamer suggestion had floated across his mind more than once that it would be a good thing if Alice and Ben married. He thought, boldly enough, that it would be a suitable match in some ways--marrying in the same faith; marrying one who would be a good husband; marrying one whose social position in Riverbank would increase rather than lower David's own capacity for good in the community. Of the marriage as a financial matter beneficial to himself and 'Thusia he refused to think, but that gossamer ghost of thought would come floating by at times: an alliance with the Derling wealth would make old age less to be dreaded; somewhere there would be food and winter warmth and a nook by the fireside, where he and 'Thusia might end their days without dire penury in case, as is so often the case with ministers, he outlived his usefulness. He felt the thought, gossamer light as it was, to be unworthy, but it came unbidden, and there was comfort in it. And no man is a worse man for not wishing to end his life in an almshouse. Certainly no man is a better man for wishing to end his days on the Riverbank Poor Farm. The youth, Roger, unluckily, seemed little likely to be able to support himself; if Alice married into poverty, or worse, the state of the family in days to come threatened to be sad indeed. But David went back to his study in hopefulness, for all that. Lanny Welsh might be better than he feared, and if Lucille Hardcome subscribed even half what she had suggested David might be able to keep even with the world or even save a little. He had hardly entered his study before Lanny Welsh and Alice came tapping on his door. XVI. AN INTERVIEW IN a small town men find themselves tagged far sooner and far more permanently than in the large cities. Let a young fellow attend church for a few weeks, behave decently for a year, and get a job as soon as one offers, and he is tagged as a “good” young man; thereafter it requires quite a little rascality to convince people he is otherwise. The small town is like a pack of cards; the rank of the components being once established, it is vain for them to attempt other values. Let young Bud Smith start out as a Jack-of-all-trades, and he is expected to remain one; and when he attempts steady work of one kind, his efforts are talked about as something phenomenal. If Bill Jones, the contractor, gives Bud a job it is considered a bit of eccentricity on Jones' part; what reason can a man have for taking on a Jack-of-all-trades as a steady carpenter! It might be just as well to be a little careful in making contracts with Jones; it looks as if he was a little too easy-going! Thus Jones gets his tag, and Bud Smith does not lose his. They cling.