derstand, not to have made his father understand.

"You think the old man's got past running his own business, and if
you don't want your money to go to the dogs you must look after it
yourself."

"Good heavens, no!" Peter broke out. "You can't dream that any such
thought entered my mind! I--why, Father, I'd rather die than have you
believe that of me."

"Prove I'm wrong, then," said the elder dryly, pulling, as was his
habit, a thin, grizzled beard with thin, sallow fingers. "You can do
it easy enough."

"How? Only tell me."

"By turning your attention to other things, my boy. Leave me alone to
manage what I know how to manage. You let me do it my own way, without
shoving in your oar, and don't you listen to what any of your highbrow
friends say about me and my methods behind my back."

"As if I would!"

"Well, I wasn't sure. You go with a set of raw boys who think they
know better than their fathers how to run creation; and now and then
you blow off some of those soap-bubble ideas in your conversation.
I've been kind of hurt once in a while, though I didn't let it out.
But now we're on the subject I will say: if you've got faith in the
old man, hands off the Hands!"

"That settles it, Father," returned Peter heavily. "I never meant to
hinder, only to help if I could. From now on the watchword is, 'hands
off the Hands!'"

This was a promise, and he kept it scrupulously. But the steady fire
in his heart was scattered as a flaming log is broken into many embers
by the clumsy stab of a poker. He had no longer a settled aim in life.
He saw no niche which he could fill, and felt that the world had no
particular use for the second Peter Rolls. The one thing he had
longed for as a boy, which did not now in his young manhood appear
stale and unprofitable, was a journey round the world and a glimpse of
the East. When his father said uneasily: "Why don't you travel, my
boy?" Peter answered that perhaps it would be a good thing.

The subject was broached to mother, and mother did not object. She had
learned long ago, when she was first married to Peter, never to object
to anything that he proposed. When she smiled and agreed with every
suggestion she was a dear little woman, and so she had spent her
existence in being a dear little woman until her hair turned white.
With her sunny nature, it had not needed a very great effort; but
sometimes, since Peter had begun to grow up, he had dimly fancied a
look of wistfulnes