“I want to begin,” said John.
“Yes,” said his father, “I want to have you, and I have had the matter a good deal in my mind. Have you any idea as to what you wish to do?”
“I thought,” said John, “that the most obvious thing would be to go into your office.” Mr. Lenox reached over for the cigar-lamp. His cigar had gone out, and his hand shook as he applied the flame to it. He did not reply for a moment.
“I understand,” he said at last. “It would seem the obvious thing to do, as you say, but,” he clicked his teeth together doubtfully, “I don’t see how it can be managed at present, and I don’t think it is what I should desire for you in any case. The fact is,” he went on, “my business has always been a sort of specialty, and, though it is still worth doing perhaps, it is not what it used to be. Conditions and methods have changed—and,” he added, “I am too old to change with them.”
“I am not,” said John.
“In fact,” resumed his father, ignoring John’s assertion, “as things are going now, I couldn’t make a place for you in my office unless I displaced Melig and made you my manager, and for many reasons I couldn’t do that. I am too dependent on Melig. Of course, if you came with me it would be as a partner, but—”
“No,” said John, “I should be a poor substitute for old Melig for a good while, I fancy.”
“My idea would be,” said Mr. Lenox, “that you should undertake a profession—say the law. It is a fact that the great majority of men fail in business, and then most of them, for lack of training or special aptitude, fall into the ranks of clerks and subordinates. On the other hand, a man who has a profession—law, medicine, whatnot—even if he does not attain high rank, has something on which he can generally get along, at least after a fashion, and he has the standing. That is my view of the matter, and though I confess I often wonder at it in individual cases, it is my advice to you.”
“It would take three or four years to put me where I could earn anything to speak of,” said John, “even providing that I could get any business at the end of the time.”
“Yes,” said his father, “but the time of itself isn’t of so much consequence. You would be living at home, and would have your allowance—perhaps,” he suggested, “somewhat diminished, seeing that you would be here—”
“I can get on with half of it,” said John confidently.
“We will settle that matter afterward,” said Mr. Lenox.
They sat in silence for some minutes, John staring thoughtfully at the table, unconscious of the occasional scrutiny of his father’s glance. At last he said, “Well, sir, I will do anything that you advise.”
“Have you anything to urge against it?” asked Mr. Lenox.
“Not exactly on my own account,” replied John, “though I admit that the three years or more seems a long time to me, but I have been drawing on you exclusively all my life, except for the little money I earned in Rush & Company’s office, and—”
“You have done so, my dear boy,” said his father gently, “with my acquiescence. I may have been wrong, but that is a fact. If in my judgment the arrangement may be continued for a while longer, and in the meantime you are making progress toward a definite end, I think you need have no misgivings. It gratifies me to have you feel as you do, though it is no more than I should have expected of you, for you have never caused me any serious anxiety or disappointment, my son.”
Often in the after time did John thank God for that assurance.
“Thank you, sir,” he said, putting down his hand, palm upward, on the table, and his eyes filled as the elder man laid his hand in his, and they gave each other a lingering pressure.
Mr. Lenox divided the last of the wine in the bottle between the two glasses, and they drank it in silence, as if in pledge.
“I will go in to see Carey & Carey in the morning, and if they are agreeable you can see them afterward,” said Mr. Lenox. “They are not one of the great firms, but they have a large and good practice, and they are friends of mine. Shall I do so?” he asked, looking at his son.
“If you will be so kind,” John replied, returning his look. And so the matter was concluded.
VIII
This history will not concern itself to any extent with our friend’s career as a law clerk, though, as he promised himself, he took it seriously and laboriously while it lasted, notwithstanding that after two years of being his own master, and the rather desultory and altogether congenial life he had led, he found it at first even more irksome than he had fancied. The novice penetrates but slowly the mysteries of the law, and, unless he be of unusual aptitude and imagination, the interesting and remunerative part seems for a long time very far off. But John stuck manfully to the reading, and was diligent in all that was put upon him to do; and after a while the days spent in the office and in the work appointed to him began to pass more quickly.
He restrained his impulse to call at Sixty-ninth Street until what seemed to him a fitting interval had elapsed; one which was longer than it would otherwise have been, from an instinct of shyness not habitual to him, and a distrustful apprehension that perhaps his advent was not of so much moment to the people there as to him. But their greeting was so cordial on every hand that Mrs. Carling’s remark that they had been
