"If the money is good enough for me to spend, it's good enough for me to earn," said Hal Surtaine a little grandiloquently.
"Humph! Well, the business is a big success, and I want you to be a big success. But that doesn't mean that I want to combine the two. Isn't there anything else you've ever thought of turning to?"
"I've got something of a leaning toward your profession, Dad."
"My prof—oh, you mean medicine."
"Yes."
"Nothing in it. Doctors are a lot of prejudiced pedants and hypocrites. Not one in a thousand is more than an inch wide. What started you on that?"
"I hardly know. It was just a notion. I think the scientific and sociological side is what appeals to me. But my interest is only theoretical."
"That's very well for a hobby. Not as a profession. Here we are, half an hour late, as usual."
The sudden and violent bite of the brakes, a characteristic operation of that mummy among railroads, the Mid-State and Great Muddy River, commonly known as the "Mid-and-Mud," flung forward in an involuntary plunge the incautious who had arisen to look after their things. Hal Surtaine found himself supporting the weight of a fortuitous citizen who had just made his way up the aisle.
"Thank you," said the stranger in a dry voice. "You're the prodigal son of whom we've heard such glowing forecast, I presume."