"Why, Tom, don't you know it's been the dream of my life to hand you down this thing that I've built myself? Don't you know there's a sentiment about it? Why, it isn't dollars and cents: I've got ten times what I want; it's pride. I'm proud of every bit of it. There isn't a new turn, mechanical or social, has come up over the world but what I've adopted it there. I haven't had a strike in fifteen years. I've done things there would open your eyes. You'd be proud. Well, what are you thinking?"
"You make it very hard, sir," he said slowly. He had not expected this sort of appeal. "If I were older, I don't know—but it's hard now." He could not tell him all the surrender would mean, and though his deeper nature had been reached he still fought on. "I'm not starting where you started, sir; that's the trouble. You went to work when you were twelve. It would be easier if I had, and, if you'll forgive me, it's your fault too that I want what I want now. I suppose I do want to begin on top, but I've been on top all these years, that's all. I couldn't do it now; perhaps later—I don't know. If I went up to the mills now I should eat my heart out. I'm sorry to have to say this to you, but it's the truth."
The father left him abruptly and seated himself at his desk without speaking.
"If I insisted you would refuse," he said slowly.
"I'm afraid I'd have to, sir," said Bojo, with a feeling of dread.
There was another silence, at the end of which Mr. Crocker drew out his check-book and looked at it solemnly.
"Good! Now he's figuring how much he'll give me and cut me off!" thought the son.
"Tom, I don't want to lose you too," said the father slowly. "I'm going to try a different way with you. You're sound and you ring true. The only trouble is you don't know; you've got to learn your lesson. So you think if you had a start you'd clean up a fortune, don't you?—and you believe—" he paused—"in Wall Street friends. Very well; I'm going to give you an opportunity to get your eyes open."
He dipped his pen in the ink and wrote a check with deliberation, while Bojo, puzzled, thought to himself: "What the deuce is he up to now?"
"I'm not going to make a bargain with you. I'm going to trust to experience and to the Crocker in you. I know the stuff you're made of. You'll never make an idler, you'll never stand that life, but you want to try it. Very well. I'm going to give you a check. It's yours. Play with it all you want. You'll get it taken away from you in two years at the most. When that happens come back to me, do you understand, where you belong! Blood's thicker than water, my boy; there's something in father and son sticking together, doing something that counts! Here, take this."