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Show 248 of their own. One sold auto parts in the next township; the other had wanted to be a doctor but had ended as a pharmacist in Wisconsin. No one had bolted the church, but it was not a family in which mystic experiences would occur. Lorin watched with sympathy the high, beaded forehead and the bony nose of the face that was shot through with more emotion than it was used to expressing as Heinmiller, in a shaky voice, corroborated or supplemented the branch president's review of the incident. He was obviously comforted by the small arm around his shoulder. The branch president was a diminutive man, with red hair and pale blue eyes. He taught sociology at one of the state colleges and was accustomed to taking charge. "I'm going to ask you, Russ, to stay out here while we go in. Can you do that for me?" He patted the shoulder and stood up, darting a glance at his councillor, who nodded. "Brethren?" said the branch president, smiling tightly at the others. They rose and followed him down the hallway, leaving Heinmiller alone, first the branch president, followed by his councillor, a tall man with heavy dark-rimmed glasses, named John Oakley, followed in turn by Elders Burton and Zaret, who were both in their first year in the mission field, followed in their turn by Sorenson, and finally Lorin himself, who had seen that glance pass between the branch president and Oakley, and who was afraid he was going to have the runs. They stopped at the doorway to the bedroom, where they made a considerable crowd, and the branch president, dropping his voice low, said, "I don't need to tell you brethren what I think this is, or why I didn't want Russ to come." Lorin narrowed his eyes and nodded, though he did not know what the branch president thought it was, and would have given a great deal to know. "But I don't think we need to alarm Dorothy if we can help it," the branch |