“Why,” replied the boy, “father and I have rather figured it out that when I get through high school I am to prepare for college if he can afford to send me. And when I get through college maybe I’ll study to be a lawyer or a doctor or a preacher. I don’t know yet.”
“Well, it’s high time you did know. A boy of your age should have his eye fixed on a certain goal, and then bend all his energy and effort to reach it.”
“But,” added Hal, “I know what I’d like to be. I’d like to be one of those settlement workers, like my cousin Jim is, or something like that, and help poor people to get their rights, and down-and-outers to have their chance to get up again.”
“Nonsense!” Mr. Barriscale gave a grunt of displeasure. “If people are poor, in nine cases out of ten it’s their own fault. It’s because they’re lazy and improvident. If they’re down and out it’s the result of indolence or dissipation. The only way to help them is to give them hard and steady work, as we do here. This settlement business and uplift business and all such schemes are more or less of a fad and a farce. Work and discipline are the only remedies for deplorable social conditions. What does your aunt, Miss Halpert, think you ought to do?”
“Well, she thinks I ought to do something to develop grit and backbone and muscle and things like that.”
“Exactly! Miss Halpert is a woman of good judgment. We don’t agree on some things; but she isn’t lacking in common sense, and she isn’t afraid to express her opinion.”
Mr. Barriscale smiled grimly as he recalled some vigorous clashes with that public-spirited and determined woman. He rather liked an opponent who fought him openly and fairly and straight from the shoulder.
“Well,” he added, “that’s all for to-day. Ben, you remain here. I have some work for you to do.”
As Hal went out into the street and swung along toward home he wondered if Mr. Barriscale’s view of life was preferable to his own. And he thought that some day, when he was older, he would like to argue it out with him. But he never did.