"Why, Miss Van Horne!" he exclaimed in great concern, "are you crying?
I beg your pardon. Of course I wouldn't think of going another step with
you. I didn't mean to trouble you. I only--If you will please take this
umbrella--"

Again he tried to transfer the umbrella and again she pushed it away.

"I--I'm not crying," she gasped; "but--oh, dear! this is SO funny!"

Mr. Ellery gazed blankly at her through the rain-streaked dark. This was
the most astonishing young person he had met in his twenty-three years
of worldly experience.

"Funny!" he repeated. "Well, perhaps it is. Our ideas of fun seem to
differ. I--"

"Oh, but it IS so funny. You don't understand. What do you think your
congregation would say if they knew you had been to a Come-Outers'
meeting and then insisted on seeing a Come-Outer girl home?"

John Ellery swallowed hard. A vision of Captain Elkanah Daniels and the
stately Miss Annabel rose before his mind's eye. He hadn't thought of
his congregation in connection with this impromptu rescue of a damsel in
distress.

"Ha, ha!" he laughed mournfully. "I guess it is rather funny, after
all."

"It certainly is. Now will you leave me and go back to your parsonage?"