It was his chance, and he knew it. But a thousand impulses leaped to life within him to make him put off what he knew he ought to say. The fear of being misunderstood--even by Marty--the knowledge that Marty, in the qualities by which boys judge and are judged, was quite as "good" as himself; and, above all, his sense of total unfitness to be a pattern of the Christian life to anybody, filled him with an uneasiness that actually hurt. And Marty soon discovered that something was amiss. Willing as he was to do his full share of the talking, he became aware that except for inarticulate commonplaces he was having to do it all. "What's the matter with you all at once, J.W.?" he asked. "You're not taken suddenly sick, are you? You were all right when we were among the trees. _Are_ you sick?" J.W. laughed shortly. "No, old man, I'm not sick. But I'm up against a new game, for me, and I'm not in training." "Sounds interesting," said Marty, "but sort of mysterious. Is it anything I can do team-work on?" "It surely is, but first I've got to say something, and I want you to promise that you won't think I'm putting on, or butting in, because I'm not; nothing like it. Will you?" "Will I promise?" said Marty, much bewildered. "Course I'll promise not to think anything about you that you don't want me to think, but I must say I don't know within a thousand miles what you're driving at. Out with it, and even if you're the train bandit who held up the Cannonball or if you've plotted to kidnap the Board of Education, I'll never tell." Marty's quizzical humor was not making J.W.'s enterprise any easier. He had always supposed that what the leaflets called "personal evangelism" had to be done in a spirit of solemnity. But how was he to acquire the proper frame of mind? And certainly there was nothing solemn about Marty just now. Yet the thing had gone too far; it was too late to retreat. He tried to think how Mr. Drury would do it, but saw only that if it was Mr. Dairy's business he would go straight to the center of it. Desperately, therefore, he plunged in. "Well, Marty," he said, speaking now with nervous haste, "what I'm up against is this. What's the matter with your being a Christian?" He will never forget the swift look of blank amazement that Marty turned on him, nor the slow-mounting flush that followed the first astonished start. For Marty did not answer, and turned his face away. J.W. was sure that in his blundering bluntness he had offended and probably angered his closest friend. The distress of that thought served at least to drive away all the self-consciousness which thus far had plagued him. "Say, Marty," he pleaded, putting his hand on the other's arm, "forget it, if I've hurt your feelings. I know as well as you do that I'm not fit to talk about such things to anybody, and, honest, I meant nothing but to say what I knew I'd got to say."