m an injustice.
Having already wronged Bauer in stealing his ideas, Walter was fast
entering on the second stage of his relations to him and beginning to
feel hateful toward him.

The other annoyance caused by his mother's letter was due to the fact
that in her ignorance of the situation she was all unconsciously
strengthening his temptation to complete the light and get it before the
public as his own as soon as possible. The street-lighting conditions in
Milton were duplicated in hundreds of municipalities all over the
country. There was no doubt in Walter's mind that the first really
successful economical lamp offered the public would find a quick and
remunerative sale. With a growing excitement he began to see the great
probabilities before his invention. And all that his mother had written
simply tended to push him on to complete his work before Bauer could
return and make the necessary discovery for himself.

He was vexed and annoyed to a degree he had never before experienced.
And he knew deep down in his heart that it was because he was acting a
dishonourable part toward the absent classmate. He began to lose sleep
over it, and grew nervous and exceedingly unhappy. On the one hand, his
home training had made him sensitive to moral standards. He would not
have dared to write to his mother about the affair to ask her advice as
to what he ought to do, because he knew without writing what she would
say. On the other hand, his ambition goaded him to ignore what it called
a technicality, tried to befog the issue by whispering that Bauer could
not succeed without putting into the lamp the things which Walter had
discovered already himself, and constantly insinuated that even if he
had not happened to see Bauer's diagram, Walter would probably have
worked it out in a day or two anyhow.

He replied to his mother's letter briefly, saying he was unusually busy
and adding that he did not think Bauer could come with him because he
had been called home and would not in all likelihood return to Burrton.
He said nothing in this letter about the lamp; he could not bring
himself to mention it. And he knew when he posted the letter that the
tone of it would make his mother ask questions because it was so
different from the enthusiastic, jolly letters he had written before.

It was during this week that he fixed on a certain evening to make a
practical test of his lamp. He had guarded his secret successfully. Not
a soul, includ