THE SON OF HIS FATHER

It's a sort of proposition like two dogs and a bone. Now from a canine point of view that bone certainly belongs to one of those dogs. No two dogs ever stole a bone together. Consequently, the situation ends in a scrap, and it isn't always a cert. that the right thief gets the bone. How it would work out between us I'm not prepared to guess, but, as 'scrap' don't belong to the vocabulary between us, we'll handle the matter in another way. Seeing the fortune—at present—belongs to me, I'll do the spending in—my own way. My way is mighty simple, too, as far as you're concerned. I'm going to stake you all you need, so you can get out and find a bone you can worry on your own. That's how you're going to pay this bill. You're going to get busy quitting play. We are, and always have been, and always will be, just two great big friends, and I'd like you to remember that when I say that the life you're living is all right for a boy, but in a man it leads to dirty ditches that aren't easy climbing out of, and—you can't do clean work with dirty hands. When you've shown me you're capable of collecting a bone for your own worrying—why, you can come right back here, and I'll be pleased and proud to hand over the reins of this organization, and I'll be mighty content to sit around in one of the back seats and get busy with the applause. Now you talk."

Gordon began without a moment's hesitation. Something of his heat had passed, but it still remained near the surface.

"Quite time I did," he cried almost sharply. "Look here, father, I don't think you meant all you said the way your talk conveyed it. To me the most important of your talk is the implied immorality of my mode of life. Then the inconsistent fashion in which you point my way towards—big finance."

His eyes lit again. They had suddenly become dangerously bright.

"Here, we're not going to quarrel, nor get angry," he went on, gathering heat of manner even in his denial. "We're too great friends for that, and you've always been too good a sportsman to me, but—but I'm not going to sit and listen to you or anybody else accusing me of immorality without kicking with all my strength!"

He brought one great fist down on the desk with a bang that set the ink-wells and other objects dancing perilously.

"I'm not angry with you. I couldn't get angry with you," he proceeded, with a suppressed excitement that added to his father's smile; "but I tell you right here I'll not stand for it from you or anybody. My only crime is spending your money, which you have always encouraged me to do. From my university days to now my whole leisure has been given up to athletics. A man can't live immorally and win the contests I have won. I don't need to name them. Boxing, sculling, running, baseball, swimming. You know that. Any sane man knows that. The money I've spent has been spent in the ordinary course of the life to which you have brought me up. You have always impressed on me the great position you occupy and the necessity for keeping my end up. That's all I have to say about my debts, but I have something to say on the subject of the inconsistency with which you censure immorality in the same breath as you demand my immediate plunge into the mire of big finance."

He paused for a moment. Then, as abruptly as it had arisen, his heat died down, and gave place to the ready humor of his real nature.

"Gee, I want to laugh!" He sprang from his seat and began to pace the floor, talking as he moved. His father watched him with twinkling, affectionate eyes. "Immorality? Psha! Was there ever anything more immoral than modern finance? You imply I have learned nothing of your organization in the three years I've been one of your secretaries. Dad," he warned, "I've learned enough to have a profound contempt for the methods of big corporations in this country, or anywhere else. It's all graft—graft of one sort or another. Do you need me to tell you of it? No, I don't think so. Twenty-five millions wouldn't cover the fortune you've made. I know that well enough. How has it been made? Here, I'll just give you one instance of the machinations of a big corporation. How did you gain control of the Union Grayling and Ukataw Railroad? Psha! What's the use? You know. You hammered it, hammered it to nothing. You got your own people into it, and sat back while they ran it nearly into bankruptcy under your orders. Then you bought. Bought it right up, and—sent it ahead. Immoral? It makes me sweat...