ss."

"What business?"

"Any kind. I want to make money."

"What do you want to make money for?"

"What does any one want money for? I want to buy----"

"Go on. Tell me exactly."

"Well, clothes and--and--I want things, so I can go out and be with
other fellows, and have something to spend--and------"

In his burst of unconcealed eagerness to get out of school Louis was
really revealing to his father some of the actual reasons for wanting to
give up his studies, and as Paul listened to him he felt that the boy's
eagerness went even farther. He determined to be very frank with him and
get at the bottom of the thing if possible.

"Do you want to make money so as to go with the girls and get popular
with them and spend money on them?"

The question was almost brutal in its directness, and one that his
father had never before suggested. Louis reddened with an angry but
self-conscious manner that told Paul he had not guessed very wide of the
real motive that was urging the boy.

He did not answer the question but sat sullenly tearing bits of paper
from the leaves of a magazine on the table. And his father sat silently
staring at him, wondering how he was going to manage Louis and help him
to make a possible manhood for himself. The problem across the library
table in this boy of his was even a greater problem than the one down at
the State House. He could afford politically to lose the bill. But could
he afford parentally to lose the boy?

"You needn't answer my question, Louis, you have answered it. Now listen
to me. I am your father and next to your mother I love you more than
anyone else in all the world. Do you believe that?"

"I suppose so," Louis managed to say.

"You know it, Louis. There is no guess work. You are sixteen. You have
fairly good health and more than average brains. The main business in
your life for the next ten years ought to be study and education. The
girls--society--all that--do you want to make a fool of yourself and
miss the one thing of manhood that's worth getting? If you do, I don't
for you. I am several years older than you are, Louis. And I am your
father for the purpose, as I believe, of really being worth something to
you in the matter of counsel and direction for your voyage over life's
great ocean. If you are planning to start out without a compass or the
right kind of equipment I would be worse than a fool if I didn't prevent
such a voyage, wouldn't I? Well, I don't inten