Judy looked up at him, surprised. "Are you fighting things out?" she asked.
"Oh, yes. I want to go to college, and I can't and that's the end of it," and Launcelot's lips were set in a stern line.
"Why not?"
"Father's too sick for me to leave—I've got to run the farm," was
Launcelot's simple statement of the bitter fact.
"I am always trying to do great things," mourned Judy, with a sigh for the Cause of Thomas the Downtrodden, from which the romance seemed to have fled, "but they just fizzle out."
"Don't be discouraged. You'll learn to look before you leap yet, Judy," and Launcelot laughed, his own troubles forgotten in his interest in hers.
"What are you going to take up for a life work?" asked Judy, remembering Ruskin.
"I am going to be a lawyer," announced Launcelot, promptly, "and a good one like the Judge. My grandfather was a Judge, too, but father chose business, and failed because he wasn't fitted for it, and that's why we are on the farm, now."
"I'm going to be an artist," announced Judy, toploftically, "and paint wonderful pictures."
But Launcelot looked at her doubtfully. "I'll bet you won't," he said with decision. "I'll bet you won't paint pictures and be an artist."