"Do your damnedest—excuse me, parson!" said he contritely. "I mean, don't stop for a little thing like me!"
Laurence leaned forward. "Man," said he, impressively, "he won't have to! You'll be marking time and keeping step with him yourself before you know it!"
"Huh!" said John Flint, non-committally.
Laurence came to spend his last evening at home with us.
"Padre," said he, when we walked up and down in the garden, after an old custom, after dinner, "do you really know what I mean to do when I've finished college and start out on my own hook?"
"Put 'Mayne & Son' on the judge's shingle and walk around the block forty times a day to look at it!" said I, promptly.
"Of course," said he. "That first. But a legal shingle can be turned into as handy a weapon as one could wish for, Padre, and I'm going to take that shingle and spank this sleepy-headed old town wide awake with it!" He spoke with the conviction of youth, so sure of itself that there is no room for doubt. There was in him, too, a hint of latent power which was impressive. One did not laugh at Laurence.
"It's my town," with his chin out. "It could be a mighty good town. It's going to become one. I expect to live all my life right here, among my own people, and they've got to make it worth my while. I don't propose to cut myself down to fit any little hole: I intend to make that hole big enough to fit my possible measure."
"May an old friend wish more power to your shovel?"
"It'll be a steam shovel!" said he, gaily. Then his face clouded.