"Do we dress for dinner?" asked John, after some little more unimportant talk.
"Yes," said his father, "in honor of the occasion, if you like. I haven't done it lately," he added, a little wearily.
"I haven't had such a glass of wine since I left home," John remarked as they sat together after dinner.
"No," said his father, looking thoughtfully at his glass, "it's the old 'Mouton,' and pretty nearly the last of it; it's very old and wants drinking," he observed as he held his glass up to get the color. "It has gone off a bit even in two years."
"All right," said John cheerfully, "we'll drink it to save it, if needs be." The elder man smiled and filled both glasses.
There had been more or less talk during the meal, but nothing of special moment. John sat back in his chair, absently twirling the stem of his glass between thumb and fingers. Presently he said, looking straight before him at the table: "I have been thinking a good deal of late—more than ever before, positively, in fact—that whatever my prospects may be," (he did not see the momentary contraction of his father's brow) "I ought to begin some sort of a career in earnest. I'm afraid," he continued, "that I have been rather unmindful, and that I might have been of some use to you as well as myself if I had stayed at home instead of spending the last two years in Europe."
"I trust," said his father, "that they have not been entirely without profit."
"No," said John, "perhaps not wholly, but their cash value would not be large, I'm afraid."
"All value is not to be measured in dollars and cents," remarked Mr. Lenox. "If I could have acquired as much German and French as I presume you have, to say nothing of other things, I should look back upon the time as well spent at almost any cost. At your age a year or two more or less—you don't realize it now, but you will if you come to my age—doesn't count for so very much, and you are not too old," he smiled, "to begin at a beginning."