"What do you mean?" cried Jasper, wheeling to run up and seize Ben's jacket-button. "Why, I'm in favor of it, this plan of yours, Ben, only it's perfectly useless to begin with;" his gray eyes turned dark with feeling as he fixed them on Ben's face.
"That's no way to favor a thing," said Ben, quite unmoved, "not to believe in it."
"But—but I can't say I believe in it, because I don't," declared Jasper, quite as obstinately in his way.
"But you can go at it as if you wanted to believe in it," said Ben, sturdily.
"Well, I will; I'll promise you that," said Jasper, "for I want it as much as you do."
"I know it," said Ben, bobbing his head.
"All right; now we'll shove ahead on it," said Jasper, with a laugh. "But Father—" and his face fell.
"If we want it," said Ben, "we've got to make him want it, too."
"Of course. Well, we'll try for it," said Jasper, swallowing hard. "But there's the school; you see it interrupts all Dr. Presbrey's work over Pip."
"I know it," said Ben, and his face fell. "But you know everybody said Pip was so dull at school."