"I was hoping to before, sir," he answered, "and I'm hoping to, even more now."
"That's the way to talk, never lose a chance for a happy phrase," was the reply. "Well, Dr. Crafts here seems willing to go bail for you—although I understand he never saw you before to-day—and I think we could get along all right, so if you're satisfied, I guess we'll call it a deal. There's one difficulty, though."
"What's that, sir?" asked the boy.
"I shall probably need to go to Florida as well, and I should like to have my assistant stay with me clear through."
"So much the better," the boy responded.
"But I understand you're going to start your freshman year in college?"
"Yes, sir," the boy answered, "I'm going to Brown."
"That's what I thought. But you see I don't expect to get back much before the tenth of October, and college will have started by then. I don't want," he continued, his eyes twinkling with fun, "to rob the other fellows of the fun of hazing you."
"I don't think there's much hazing at Brown, sir, and perhaps I shall miss some of the fun of the opening of the year," Colin replied, after thinking for a minute or two; "but I'd much rather take the trip with you, sir, and I can soon catch up with my class in any subject the first few lectures of which I may have missed."