ong in----" He hesitated for a
finish of his phrase.

The professor supplied it, and ruthlessly.

"Mental carpet slippers. Precisely. And I could give him boots and
spurs."

"Why don't you do it, then?" Opdyke asked him bluntly.

In the interest of the subject, the old professor forgot that he was
talking to one of his students and about another.

"Because he's got the very devil of a conscience, and won't let me.
There is a widowed mother in the background, and a perfect retinue of
preaching ancestors, whole dozens of them and all Baptists, and they
have conspired to poison the boy's mind with the notion that it's up to
him to preach, too. It would be all right, if he had anything to say;
but he hasn't. He's tongue-tied and unmagnetic at the best; what's
more, he has learned too many things to let him flaunt abroad the old
beliefs as battle standards. He's gone too far, and not far enough. His
life is bound to be a miserable sort of compromise, a species of
battledore and shuttlecock arrangement between the limits of the deep
sea and the devil." And then the professor pulled himself up short.
"Know him?" he queried curtly, as he lit his match.

Opdyke nodded.

"As one does know people one never meets out anywhere," he said.

"What do you mean by that?" The question was still curt.

"He waits at my joint."

"Of course. And?"

Opdyke laughed.

"How do you know there is an _and_, Professor?" he asked easily.

"Because I know you, and because I've heard of 'Reed's parson.' You're
your father's own son, Reed. You never could get a starveling like
Scott Brenton out of sight of your conscience. How much have you seen
of him?"

"Not much." And Opdyke gave a few details.

The professor nodded thoughtfully. Then,--

"See more," he ordered; "any amount more. You have time enough, you
lazy young sinner, and I'll be answerable for all the consequences."

Opdyke yielded to his curiosity.

"What kind of consequences?"

"The inevitable kind that follow all you youngsters. Listen, boy.
Brenton is a mixture of genius, and prig, and ignorant young hermit;
or, rather, he has the elements all inside him, ready to be mixed.
You'll have to do the mixing."

"I?" Opdyke looked startled. "Professor, what a beast of a bore!"

"No matter if it is. I believe in the conservation of all latent
energy. Brenton's is all latent, and I count on you to do the
conserving. I've been asking questions lately. From all accounts, yo