The mill-owner nodded, let his eye travel over the boy's flushed face, and then, as if satisfied by what he saw there, he put out his hand.
"I have been hearing very excellent reports of you, Turner," said he, "and I wished to investigate for myself the quarters they have given you to live in. You've made a mighty shipshape little den of this place."
"It didn't need very much done to it," protested Ted, blushing under the fixed gaze of the great man. "I just cleaned it up and arranged the furniture. Mr. Wharton was kind enough to give me most of it."
"I can't claim any thanks," laughed the manager. "The traps I gave you were all cast-offs and not in use. It is what you have done with them that is the marvel."
"You certainly have turned your donations to good purpose," Mr. Fernald observed. "I've been noticing your books in your absence and see that most of them are textbooks on electricity. I judge you are interested in that sort of thing."
"Yes, sir, I am."
"Humph!"
The financier drummed reflectively on the arm of his chair.
"How did you happen to go into that?" he asked presently.
"I have been studying it at school. My father is letting me go through the high school—at least he hopes to let me finish my course there. I have been two years already. That is why I am working during the summer."