emnly. "When I begin to make
money, you'll never have to worry any more about anything."

Again she had to kiss him.

He was then a little more than halfway through his fifteenth year.

XXV

When his father came home that night, Keith hurried across the room to
meet him. "Papa," he cried full of subdued excitement and a swelling of
self-importance such as he had not experienced for ever so long. "I have
got a job."

"What kind of a job," asked the father quietly.

"In an office." And Keith sputtered out the details.

When the whole story was told, the father stood looking at him
enigmatically for a long while.

"Perhaps it is just as well," he said at last. "It certainly will make
things easier for me. But bear in mind what I now tell you, boy: you
will live to regret the chance you are throwing away--a chance for which
I would have given one of my hands when I was of your age."

"Did you want me to go on," Keith asked uncertainly.

"I did--I always hoped that you should pass your university examinations
and wear the white cap."

"And what did you want me to become?"

"A civil engineer--that's the only real profession today."

The idea was too novel to be grasped quickly by the boy. His own
thoughts had never strayed in that direction, and his conception of an
engineer's duties and position was extremely vague.

"An engineer," he repeated. "But then I should not have studied Latin."

"Of course not, but you chose it without asking my opinion first."

Keith's surprise increased.

"Why didn't you tell me," he insisted.

"Because I wanted you to begin to shape your own life," the father
replied, "and I thought you knew what you wanted."

Keith could hardly believe his own ears.

"What do you want me to do now," he pleaded at last.

"What you feel you must," rejoined the father. "This concerns your
life, and not mine. And you must make up your own mind. Whatever you
decided, you have my good wishes, boy, and I shall try to help you as
far as I can."

For a moment Keith had a sense of never having known his father before.
Then a thought flashed through his head: why did he not speak before?

He went into the parlour and stood at the window staring at the gloomy
facade of the distillers across the lane. A motley throng of thoughts
chased each other through his brain.

It was not yet too late. Nothing was settled. He could still drop the
job and go back to school if he wanted. But did he want