This letter Doctor Mack had read to his housekeeper, Miss Nancy Sprague.
“Well, Nancy,” he said, “Walter is at work.”
“You don't say so, doctor! What is he doing?”
“He is a life-insurance agent.”
“Is that a good business?”
“Walter writes that one agent is making a hundred and twenty-five dollars a week,” answered the doctor, with a humorous twinkle in his eye.
“I'm glad Master Walter has got such a good business,” said the housekeeper, brightening up. “That's a great sum for a boy like him to make.”
“It isn't he that has made it, Nancy. There are very few that do, and those have to be old and experienced men.”
“Well, he'll make a good living, anyhow.”
“Perhaps so,” answered the doctor dubiously, for he understood better than Nancy how precarious were the chances of an inexperienced agent. He was not at all surprised when Walter wrote later that though he had met with some success, he thought it better to look for a situation with a regular salary attached.