"What does any one want money for? I want to buy——"
"Go on. Tell me exactly."
"Well, clothes and—and—I want things, so I can go out and be with other fellows, and have something to spend—and———"
In his burst of unconcealed eagerness to get out of school Louis was really revealing to his father some of the actual reasons for wanting to give up his studies, and as Paul listened to him he felt that the boy's eagerness went even farther. He determined to be very frank with him and get at the bottom of the thing if possible.
"Do you want to make money so as to go with the girls and get popular with them and spend money on them?"
The question was almost brutal in its directness, and one that his father had never before suggested. Louis reddened with an angry but self-conscious manner that told Paul he had not guessed very wide of the real motive that was urging the boy.
He did not answer the question but sat sullenly tearing bits of paper from the leaves of a magazine on the table. And his father sat silently staring at him, wondering how he was going to manage Louis and help him to make a possible manhood for himself. The problem across the library table in this boy of his was even a greater problem than the one down at the State House. He could afford politically to lose the bill. But could he afford parentally to lose the boy?
"You needn't answer my question, Louis, you have answered it. Now listen to me. I am your father and next to your mother I love you more than anyone else in all the world. Do you believe that?"
"I suppose so," Louis managed to say.
"You know it, Louis. There is no guess work. You are sixteen. You have fairly good health and more than average brains. The main business in your life for the next ten years ought to be study and education. The girls—society—all that—do you want to make a fool of yourself and miss the one thing of manhood that's worth getting? If you do, I don't for you. I am several years older than you are, Louis. And I am your father for the purpose, as I believe, of really being worth something to you in the matter of counsel and direction for your voyage over life's great ocean. If you are planning to start out without a compass or the right kind of equipment I would be worse than a fool if I didn't prevent such a voyage, wouldn't I? Well, I don't intend to let you do just as you please just because for the time being you choose to go your own gait. Mind, Louis, I am not going to ask you to do impossible things or be tyrannical with you. But neither do I intend that you should throw away a splendid chance for education just to gratify a present longing to make money for the purpose you want it for."