“Oh, you’ll get a job, of course,” said his sister sympathetically, trying to reconcile his troubled look with what the children had said about his indifference toward work. “Where did you work last?”
The color rolled in a slow, dull wave over Carey’s restless young face; and a look of sullen hopelessness came into his handsome eyes.
“Oh, I haven’t had anything regular since I left school. I—you see—that is—oh, hang it all! I can’t get anything worth while. I’ve been doing some tinkering down at the garage. I could work steady there, but Dad makes it so hot for me when I do that I have to do it on the sly. He says it’s just a lazy job, hanging round with the fellas getting rides. He don’t know anything about it. It’s real man’s work, I tell you, hard work at that; and I’m learning all about machinery. Why, Nell, there isn’t a fella at the garage can tell as quick as I can what’s the matter with a car. Bob sends for me to find out after he’s worked half a day, and I can tell right off the bat when I hear the engine go what’s wrong.”
Cornelia watched his eyes sparkle as he talked, and perceived that when he spoke of machinery he was in his element. He loved it. He loved it as she loved the idea of her chosen profession.
That being the case, he ought to be encouraged.
“Why, I should think it was a good thing to stick at it while you are looking around for something better,” she said slowly, wondering whether her father would blame her for going against his advice; “I should think maybe it will prepare you for something else in the line of machinery. What is there big and really worth while that you’d like to get into if you could? Of course, you wouldn’t want to be just a mender of cars all your life.”
His face took on a firm, manly look, and his eyes grew alert and earnest.
“Of course not!” he said crisply. “Father thinks I would, and I can’t make him see it any other way. He’s just plain disappointed in me, that’s all”—the young man’s tone took on a bitter tinge,—“but I know it will be a step to something. Why, there’s all sorts of big concerns now that make and sell machines; and, if you understand all about machinery, you stand a better chance for getting in to be business manager some day. There’s tanks, and oil-wells, and tractors, and a lot of things. Of course I couldn’t jump into a thing like that at the start. Dad thinks I could. He thinks if I had any pep at all I could just walk up to the president of some big concern, and say, ‘Here I am; take me,’ and he’d do it, just like that. But—for one thing, look at me! Do I look like a business man?” He stood back, and lifted his arms with a dramatic gesture, pointing toward his shabby raiment.
“And then another thing, I’ve got to get experience first. If I only had a pull somewhere—but——”
“I’ll talk to father,” said Cornelia soothingly. She looked at him thoughtfully. “You ought to earn enough for a new suit right away, of course, and have it ready—keep it nice, I mean, so that, when a good opportunity offers, you will be suitably dressed to apply for it. Suppose I talk to father; I’ll do it tonight. Meantime, you help me here a day or two, and then you go back to that garage, and work for a week or two, and earn money enough for your suit and what other things you need, and keep your eye open for something better all the while.”