ntleman!"

"Oh, I suppose I learned that all right," Jack acquiesced. "And I've
been working hard at the profession ever since--sixteen to twenty
hours a day, no half-holidays and no Sundays off. I can't stand it any
longer. So I've decided to go on strike."

"Strike?" exclaimed his mother, bewildered.

"Yes. For better conditions. I'm tired loafing such long hours. I'd
like a little leisure in which to work."

"Work!" repeated his mother--and human voice could hardly express
amazement greater than did hers. "Work! Jack--you're not in earnest?"

He held upon her a clear-eyed, humorous, but resolute face.

"Don't I look in earnest?"

He did; and his mother could only dazedly repeat, "Work! You go to
work!"

"Oh, not at once. No, thank you! I want to ask you to give me a little
proper education first that will equip me to do something. You've
spent--how much have you spent on my education, mother? Tens and tens
of thousands, I know. Pretty big investment, on the whole. Now, how
large returns do you suppose I can draw on that investment?"

"I was not thinking about dividends; I was thinking about fitting you
for your station," returned his mother stiffly.

"Well, as for me, I've been thinking of late about how much I could
get out of that investment. I've wanted to test myself and find what
I was worth--as a worker." He leaned a little closer. "I say, mother,"
he said confidentially, "you remember that little explanation I just
gave you of my absence."

"About your trip in that high-powered automobile?"

"That was just a high-powered fib. Just a bit of diplomatic
romance--for Olivetta's consumption."

"Then where have you been?" demanded Mrs. De Peyster.

"Prospecting. Prospecting to find out just how much that hundred
thousand or two or three you've sunk in me is worth. And I've found
out. It's present value is not quite nine a week."

"You mean?"

"I mean," he said pleasantly, "I've been at work."

"At work!"

Mrs. De Peyster slowly rose and looked down at him with staring,
loose-fallen face.

"At work!" she gasped again. "At work!"

"Yes, mother. At work."

"But--but that skidding automobile? Those hands?"

"Blisters, mother dear. Most horrible blisters."

"You've worked--you've worked--at what?"

"Well, you see, mother, if I could have knocked out a home run, say
a job as a railroad president, when I stepped up to the plate in the
first inning, I suppose I wouldn't have backed away from