rather decent of
him, isn't it, if he blows out his brains? In the other professions it
somehow seems cowardly."

"I am not competent to pronounce," said Mr. Pembroke, who was not
accustomed to have his schoolroom satire commented on. "I merely know
that the army is the finest profession in the world. Which reminds me,
Rickie--have you been thinking about yours?"

"No."

"Not at all?"

"No."

"Now, Herbert, don't bother him. Have another meringue."

"But, Rickie, my dear boy, you're twenty. It's time you thought. The
Tripos is the beginning of life, not the end. In less than two years you
will have got your B.A. What are you going to do with it?"

"I don't know."

"You're M.A., aren't you?" asked Agnes; but her brother proceeded--

"I have seen so many promising, brilliant lives wrecked simply on
account of this--not settling soon enough. My dear boy, you must think.
Consult your tastes if possible--but think. You have not a moment to
lose. The Bar, like your father?"

"Oh, I wouldn't like that at all."

"I don't mention the Church."

"Oh, Rickie, do be a clergyman!" said Miss Pembroke. "You'd be simply
killing in a wide-awake."

He looked at his guests hopelessly. Their kindness and competence
overwhelmed him. "I wish I could talk to them as I talk to myself," he
thought. "I'm not such an ass when I talk to myself. I don't believe,
for instance, that quite all I thought about the cow was rot." Aloud he
said, "I've sometimes wondered about writing."

"Writing?" said Mr. Pembroke, with the tone of one who gives everything
its trial. "Well, what about writing? What kind of writing?"

"I rather like,"--he suppressed something in his throat,--"I rather like
trying to write little stories."

"Why, I made sure it was poetry!" said Agnes. "You're just the boy for
poetry."

"I had no idea you wrote. Would you let me see something? Then I could
judge."

The author shook his head. "I don't show it to any one. It isn't
anything. I just try because it amuses me."

"What is it about?"

"Silly nonsense."

"Are you ever going to show it to any one?"

"I don't think so."

Mr. Pembroke did not reply, firstly, because the meringue he was eating
was, after all, Rickie's; secondly, because it was gluey and stuck his
jaws together. Agnes observed that the writing was really a very good
idea: there was Rickie's aunt,--she could push him.

"Aunt Emily never pushes any one; she says they always rebound and cru