"Keep your mouth shut. Unfortunately I can't do much more than run you
away from here, for I don't care to evict your parents from their home
for your folly; and they do not support you. Mr. Evans will pay you off
in the morning with a month's extra wages."

"I won't take a cent I haven't earned," George said.

Old Planter studied him with more curiosity.

"You're a queer livery stable boy."

"I'm banking on that," George said, willing the other should make what
he would of it.

"It's there if you wish it," Old Planter went on. "I sent for you so
that I could tell you myself that you will be away from Oakmont and
from the neighbourhood by noon to-morrow. And remember your home is now
a portion of Oakmont. You will never come near us again. You will forget
what happened this afternoon."

He stood up, his face reddening. George wanted to tell him that Sylvia
herself had said he shouldn't forget.

"If, Morton," the old man went on with a biting earnestness, "once
you're away from Oakmont, you ever bother Miss Sylvia again, or make any
attempt to see her, I'll dispossess your parents, and I'll drive you out
of any job you get. I'll keep after you until you'll understand what
you're defying. This isn't an idle threat. I have the power."

The father completely conquered him. He clenched his knotted fists.

"I'd destroy a regiment of creatures like you to spare my little girl
one of the tears you caused her this afternoon."

"After all," George said, defensively, "I'm a human being."

Old Planter shook his head.

"If your father hadn't failed you'd have spent your life in a livery
stable. It takes education, money, breeding to make a human being."

George nodded. He wouldn't need to plan much for himself, after all.
Sylvia's father was doing it for him.

"I've heard some pretty hard words to-day, sir," he said. "It's waked me
up. Can't a man get those things for himself?"

He fancied reminiscence in Old Planter's eyes.

"The right kind can. Get out of here now, Morton, and don't let me see
you or hear of you again."

George stepped between him and the table to pick up his cap. His nerves
tightened. Close to his cap lay an unmounted photograph, not very large,
of Sylvia. What a companion piece for the broken crop! What an ornament
for an altar dedicated to ambition, to anger, and to love! He would take
it under her father's nose, following her father's threats.

He slipped his cap over the photograph, and