er."

When Paul reached home he told Esther somewhat in detail the incidents
of the boat race and his interview with the president. He was hopeful
for Walter and believed the boy had learned his lesson and would not
fail at that point again. But he could not understand the particular
"streak," as he called it, in Walter's make up, which seemed to demand
expensive and needless luxuries.

"The boy had bought a very elaborate dresser. It was quartered oak and
had a number of patent arrangements about it that made it unusually
expensive. Walter confessed it cost him forty-seven dollars. This was
one of the things he went in debt for. It seems he had become enamoured
of just such a dresser in one of the rooms he had been caring for, a
suite belonging to Van Shaw, the son of the steel magnate at Allworth.
Of course, we want our son to go through school with all the comforts
around him necessary for his proper culture and education. But I cannot
see for the life of me how a forty-seven dollar quartered oak dresser is
going to make any more of a man of him, especially when he goes in debt
for it. I told him so and to my disappointment he took what I said
rather badly. That is, he flared up some and seemed hurt at my criticism
of his luxurious habits. But it isn't the luxurious tastes I object to
so much as the reckless and inexcusable act of going in debt for such a
thing; that is perfectly inexcusable. Where did Walter get his tastes,
do you suppose?"

"Oh, dear, I don't know," said Esther with a sigh. "You know Louis used
to have just a streak in him. Perhaps some of my ancestors on father's
side were French aristocrats before the revolution. You know the Darcys
had estates in southern France in the sixteenth century. I don't believe
any more than you do, Paul, that a forty-seven dollar dresser is at all
necessary to Walter's education. He will have to learn better ways. We
must not forget his splendid good qualities in other directions. He has
a great many. I can't believe he is going to disappoint us."

"No, I can't believe that," said Paul gravely. "But the boy has much to
learn and I hope he will learn it without unnecessary suffering."

It was this same week, two days after the receipt of his mother's
letter, that Walter had an unusual and rather dramatic opportunity to
act on his mother's advice, in the matter of asserting his rights about
the kind of conversation he would permit in his own room.

Walter had very