CHAPTER XII

THE FIRST CALAMITY

Three days after the vestry meeting at which the resolution of dismissal was adopted, Westgate received a note from his fiancée asking him to call that evening. He was not slow to read between the lines of her message the fact that she desired to talk with him about the Farrar case. From the day of their Sunday walk the preceding September their differences concerning the trouble in the church had grown ever greater. The matter had been discussed between them many times and with great frankness, but of late the discussions had not been marked by that intimacy of feeling which had before characterized them. The controversy had not been unfriendly, but it had been fruitless and deadening. Nor was there any longer any hope of a reconciliation of opinion. While Ruth became more and more deeply absorbed in the regeneration of the church after the manner advocated by its rector, and gave increasingly of her time and ability to the crusade, Westgate, on the contrary, became more thoroughly convinced that the entire scheme was Utopian, impractical and visionary, and must end in disaster to the church, and in eventual defeat and humiliation for those who were engaged in it. To both of the lovers the situation was poignant and extreme. Westgate felt it the most deeply because for him there were no compensations. He had not the spiritual absorption in the contest that would lead to a certain satisfaction of the soul whether it were won or lost. His interest was simply that of a man convinced of the mighty economic