Page:Elmer Gantry (1927).djvu/89

 she had thought, and Elmer reflected proudly that he really did know what all but a couple of the words meant.

"My!" sighed his mother. "You're getting so educated, I declare t' goodness pretty soon I won't hardly dare to talk to you!"

"Oh, no. There'll never come a time when you and I won't be the best of pals, or when I won't need the inspiration of your prayers!" said Elmer Gantry melodiously, with refined but manly laughter.

They were assembling on benches, wagon-seats and boxes for the ceremony of ordination.

The pulpit was a wooden table with a huge Bible and a pitcher of lemonade. Behind it were seven rocking chairs for the clergy, and just in front, two hard wooden chairs for the candidates.

The present local pastor, Brother Dinger, was a meager man, slow of speech and given to long prayers. He rapped on the table. "We will, uh, we will now begin."

. . . Elmer, looking handsome on a kitchen chair in front of the rows of flushed hot faces. He stopped fretting that his shiny new black shoes were dust-gray. His heart pounded. He was in for it! No escape! He was going to be a pastor! Last chance for Jim Lefferts, and Lord knew where Jim was. He couldn't— His shoulder muscles were rigid. Then they relaxed wearily, as though he had struggled to satiety, while Brother Dinger went on:

"Well, we'll start with the usual, uh, examination of our young brothers, and the brethren have, uh, they've been good enough, uh, to let me, uh, in whose charge one, uh, one of these fine young brothers has always lived and made his home—to let me, uh, let me ask the questions. Now, Brother Gantry, do you believe fully and whole-heartedly in baptism by immersion?"

Elmer was thinking, "What a rotten pulpit voice the poor duck has," but aloud he was rumbling:

"I believe, Brother, and I've been taught, that possibly a man might be saved if he'd just been baptized by sprinkling or pouring, but only if he were ignorant of the truth. Of course