"Oh, I plane and saw and glue up boards and make things."
"What things?"
Louis hesitated. "You'll laugh."
"No, I won't." Paul felt more like crying than laughing as Louis eyed him doubtfully.
"Great God!" he felt like saying to himself. "Here I have been so busy with everybody else's affairs that my own son is afraid of me."
"Well, I finished a writing desk the other day. I was going to give it to mother for her birthday. I brought it home last night."
"A writing desk! Let me see it."
"It's in my room," Louis said with some hesitation.
"I want to see it," said Paul. He rose to go up stairs and had got as far as the hall when the telephone rang.
"Go on. I'll come as soon as I answer this," Paul said, and Louis hurried up stairs as if he wanted to get there some time before his father.