"A practical knowledge?"
"As practical as it is possible for a man in my position to acquire."
"Very good. It is a sorry thing to see a young man with misdirected energies. I'll undertake to direct yours. In January I want you to go to Mexico for me."
"Mexico?"
"Mexico. I have large mining interests there which need the presence of a man who can fight, both mentally and physically. I will pay you a good salary, and if you win, some stock shall go with the victory. Now don't think that I'm doing this out of sympathy for you. I am looking at you from a purely commercial point of view. Will you accept?"
"With all my heart," with a burst of enthusiasm.
"That's the way to talk. We'll arrange about the salary after dinner. Now, go down to the music-room. You will find Miss Boderick there. She will manage to entertain you till dinner time; and while you are about it, you may thank her instead of me. I shouldn't have thought of you but for her. Don't worry over what the newspapers have said. In six months this affair will have blown over, and you will have settled the mining dispute one way or the other. You will excuse me now, as I have some important letters to write. And, mind you, if you breathe a word that I was at the fight last night ..."
So the Reverend Richard Allen stole quietly down to the music-room. It was dark; and he entered softly and sat down in a corner at the farther end of the room, so as not to disturb the musician. In all the years of his life, the life which numbered thirty variegated years, he had never known such happiness.
In the study above the general chuckled as he wrote, and murmured from time to time the word: "Milksop!"