Kitabı oku: «The Continental Monthly , Vol. 2 No. 5, November 1862», sayfa 5

ONE OF THE MILLION

Shoemaker Scheffer opened his shop within sight of the college buildings, and expected to live by trade. He was young and skilful, obliging, and prompt, and acquired, ere long, a substantial reputation. Prosperity did not mislead him; he applied his income to the furtherance of his business, abhorred debt, squandered nothing, was exact and persevering.

At work early and late, he seemed the model of contentment, as he was of industry. Prompt, obliging, careful, he made the future easy of prediction.

But though the ruddy firelight shines well on the window panes, what griefs, what agonies, what discords, are developed around the hearthstone. Scheffer's quiet demeanor was, in some degree, deception. One woman in the world knew it was so—no other being did.

The immediate excitant of his unrest was found in the college students, who passed his place of business at all hours of the day. He remembered that he might have worked his way into the ranks of those fellows. Nothing vexed him so much as to see a lounger among them; for he must needs think of the time when, a stripling, he agonized over his choice, and said to himself, thinking of his mother (dead now, when the comfort he toiled for was secured), 'Time enough for books when I am sure of bread; flesh is needy and perishing, spirit is eternal.' He had walked out of school to the counter of his uncle, and stood behind it seven years, doing with earnest might what his hand found to do.

And here he was now, on his own ground, wistfully looking over his barriers into the college yard, and, shall we say it, envying the career of every studious lad—most of all that of the scholarly Harry Cromwell, and the broad-browed, proud young Mitchell, who came into his shop now and then, in remembrance of old days; for these lads could all remember when they stood in one straight line among the social forces, and neither had marched out of the old division to take rank in the new.

One day Paul Mitchell strolled into Scheffer's shop. Scheffer, at the moment, was reading a newspaper, and he did not instantly throw the sheet aside: he thought it unlikely that Paul required his service. But at last, laying the paper away, and going up to Mitchell, he asked:

'What will you have, this morning?'

Paul's bright eyes smiled, full of fun.

'I'll have fifty thousand dollars, straight, and a library like that in the Atheneum.'

'You want shoeing more,' was Scheffer's dry response; and, turning from the youth, he went back to his counter, and emptied thereon a large box of patent leathers, which he began to assort.

Gradually Paul approached, and at last he took up a pair of the boots, and asked the price. Scheffer named it; Paul threw them down again.

'You might as well ask fifty dollars as three. It's you fellows who have all the money.'

'Do you think so?' answered Scheffer; and he began to collect his goods again, and to pack them in separate boxes. He was careful, however, to throw aside the pair that had tempted Mitchell to confess a truth.

At last, when the counter was cleared, he took the boots, and said to the boy, pointing to one of the sofas:

'Sit down there, my man.'

Paul did as bidden. Scheffer untied his shoestring, drew off the dusty, worn-out shoe, and tried the pair in his hand. The fit was perfect.

Then Scheffer looked up, and, without rising, asked:

'How long have you to study before you graduate?'

'Five years.'

'Why do you speak in that way?'

'How did I speak?' asked Paul.

'Discouraged like.'

'You're mistaken.'

'Am I? Then why look so solemn? I'd like your chance.'

'You would!' exclaimed Paul, incredulous. 'Why, you had such a chance yourself once, and you didn't accept it, if they know the facts at home.'

Scheffer stood up.

'Who says that?' he asked, quietly. Still, the question had a hurried sound to Paul. 'Did any one in that house remember!'

'Josephine told me so. She thinks you made a wise choice. So do I. I wish I was as well off as you are, doing something for a support. And it was on account of your mother you made the choice! But my mother insists on my having a profession. Stuff! But nobody seems satisfied. That's one kind of consolation.'

Scheffer was silent for a moment. Half of Paul's words were unheard; but enough had struck through sense to spirit, and he said:

'Do you want to be shod for the next five years? I'll strike a bargain with you, Paul.'

'What can I do for you?' asked the astonished lad.

'I'll tell you, and if you don't like it, why, no matter—that's all.' And Scheffer added, in an earnest tone: 'I don't know but it's living near the college, hearing the bell ring, and seeing the fellows with their books, has bewitched me; any way, I'm thinking I must have an education, and I wish to get it systematically. I always thought I could have it when I chose; but if I don't bestir myself, I shall not be able to choose much longer.'

August wiped his forehead as he spoke; but he had said it. Gravely, anxiously he looked at Paul. He could have forgiven him even a smile. But Paul did not smile. Neither did he hesitate too long to rob his words of grace.

'What will you study?' he asked.

'Whatever you set me at.'

'Latin?'

'They say a fool is not a perfect fool till he has studied Latin. No, I thank you. Five years, did you say?'

'Five years,' repeated Paul, this time without sighing.

'Well, get the books I need. You know what they are. Bring the bill to me. Have it made out in your name, though, I'll settle the account. Mum's the word, Paul. I won't have snobs laughing at the learned shoemaker. The secret is mine.'

Paul promised. Scheffer thereupon picked up the student's worn-out shoes, and tossed them into a distant heap of rubbish, and the lad went on his way rejoicing. He was a widow's son, and poor; and to be shod as a gentleman should be was a serious matter to him.

II

But, as to the secret, there was Josephine, who shared the family burden of poverty and pride; Josephine, who was a beauty, and not spoiled at that, but light of heart and cheerful, disposed to make the best of things; laughing lightly over mishaps which made her mother weep; Josephine, of whose fair womanhood as much was hoped in a worldly way as of Paul's talents; Josephine, to whom Paul told everything: how could he withhold from her August Scheffer's curious secret?

That afternoon, when he went home, Paul found her in the porch. She had a book; of course, it was one of Cromwell's. Paul discovered that when he had settled himself near her, with a book in his own hand. He had come to her so conscious of his late bargain, and the immediate benefit he had derived therefrom, that he expected an instant leaning toward discovery on her part. But Josephine was absorbed in her occupation, and though she looked up and smiled when she saw Paul coming, she looked down again and sighed the next instant, and continued reading with a gravity that soon attracted his notice. Her looks troubled him. Of late, a shadow seemed to have fallen darkly over her; she was, though Paul understood it not, in the struggle of youth with life. Do you know what that struggle is? Not all who pass through it go on their way rejoicing, over the everlasting blessedness won from the 'good and great angel.' For then this earth more manifestly were the world of the redeemed ones.

Not long before, Paul had heard Josephine say that she would not live on in this idle way. She must find some work to do. Perhaps, he thought, the sense of a necessity her mother instantly and constantly denied when Josephine spoke of it, is now again oppressing her. However occasioned, Paul's face saddened when he looked at her. The maddening impatience he had felt many times—impatience for the strength and efficiency of manhood—once more tormented him; it grew an intolerable thought to him that so many years must pass before he should be prepared to do a man's work, earn a man's wages—do as August Scheffer was doing.

Such sombre reflections as these absorbed him, when he became suddenly conscious of the eyes of Josephine. She sat looking upon him; disturbed anew, it seemed, by the show of his disturbance. His eyes met hers, and she said:

'What is it, Paul? What has gone wrong with you?'

'Nothing. But it is enough to give one the horrors to see you looking so like destruction. Something has happened, Josephine; what is it?'

'What fine shoes you have on, Paul!' she said, quickly, pretending to be absorbed in the discovery she had only that instant made.

Paul laughed, and blushed.

'I earned them,' said he.

'Earned them!' Josephine's beautiful eyes were full of surprise, of admiration even, as she now fixed them on her brother. 'I wish I could earn anything—a row of pins, or a loaf of bread.'

'If you did, you wouldn't eat all the loaf yourself. But I spent all my wage on myself, you see! But I did earn them—at least, I'm going to, before I get through.'

'How in the world did you do it, Paul?'

'I am a tutor, Josephine,' said he, with mock gravity. She answered, earnestly:

'You're a good fellow, any way, tutor or not. It's a secret, then, this business?'

'Yes, the deadest kind of a dead secret. But I shall tell you. I made a mental reservation of you. August Scheffer–'

Josephine started, trembled, looked away from Paul, recovered herself in an instant; then looked back again, and straight into his eyes. Paul saw nothing strange in this; he went on quietly:

'Scheffer is getting ambitious! If I had a shop and such a business as his, catch me bothering about books!'

'He was always fond of reading,' answered Josephine. 'You know what a reader his mother was? No, you don't know. You were too young. Well, he wants you to help him, and you are to be shod.'

'Yes, that's the whole of it. Why don't you laugh, or be surprised. I shall do my best with him.'

'I should hope you would do better than your best. Be punctual and steady in this business; for, really, you owe August Scheffer more than a shop full of shoes is worth. You will get as much good as you can possibly give. I wish I had your chance!'

'To teach him, Josephine?'

'To be a helpful man, dear Paul.'

'As far as I can see, everybody in these days is wishing that he was somebody else. That's what's the matter with Scheffer.'

'No,' said Josephine, quietly; 'it isn't. Not that. He wouldn't take any man's place that lives. Ask him.'

'Of course he would say 'No.' He is proud as Lucifer.'

'I like his spirit.'

'Yes, and you like Cromwell's spirit, too. What in the world do you suppose he is going to do?'

'What?' asked Josephine, as if she did not know.

Paul surveyed her for a moment. Did she not know? He could not decide. He could look through most people, simple, earnest, penetrating fellow that he was; but not through Josephine.

'Cromwell is going abroad,' he said, finally. 'He's been talking with a sea captain for a month back. It's all out now. He's going to quit his class, and take deck passage for Havre; going to the school of mines in Paris, and, when through with that, on a mineral hunt from Africa to Siberia. And he hasn't a cent of money! Perhaps that's the spirit you like. Perhaps you won't object to my going with him.'

Josephine looked at Paul; she was not in the least alarmed. 'I like the spirit well enough,' she said, 'but it isn't your kind; it would be misery to do a thing in that way, for you. He has another 'fervor.''

'Yes, he has,' said Paul, with a deeper meaning than his sister guessed.

'You say I like a queer kind of spirit,' said she. 'I like independence. But there's some great lack in me, there must be. I'm what you call too prudent, I suppose. I seem unable to put out of sight the chances of failure; and it can't be that people who venture a great deal think much of them. I wish, as you do, that Harry had a little money—ever so little—to fall back on. He never seems to think of accidents, or sickness; but he is going to a strange country, and, to be sure, if he is able to do exactly what he expects, he will succeed; and in the end he will, I know, whatever happens. But it would be dreadful for him to meet with misfortunes, though he laughs at my croaking. Everything is to turn out just as he wants! But do things often, I wonder?'

'Yes, with August Scheffer—the only one I know of.'

'But you never can know the struggle he passed through; it was terrible. You call him a philosopher; he is so, because he found out early how to fight the good fight. Nothing will ever look so alluring to him as the career he might have had by choosing the thing he did not choose.' Ceasing to speak aloud and to Paul, Josephine added, in a voice no one could hear: 'I was in the midst of that struggle; I understand him as no one else does. And—he knows it.'

'Tell me about it,' said Paul. 'You don't know how much I admire Scheffer.'

'Well you may,' she answered; 'but there is nothing to tell. He had the opportunity to keep at school, or to go into his uncle's shop—and he chose the shop on his mother's account.'

'And I chose a profession on my mother's account,' said Paul bitterly.

Josephine laid her hand on his; it was a gentle touch, but it recalled him.

'The best choice in both cases,' said she. 'Any one can see you are not expert enough to make a successful trader. Ask August if a man must not have a talent for trade, just as an artist must have a genius for painting.'

'Then you think August a born trader?'

'I know he can do more than one thing well,' she answered.

'If you think so well of August,' said he, 'I don't see how you can think better of another fellow. The town couldn't contain him if he heard what you said just now.'

Josephine turned a page of her book.

'He knows perfectly well what I think of him, Paul.'

The very frankness of her words and manner misled the boy. The curious suspicion that for a moment had beset him fled fast before his laughter.

She went on reading—seemed to do so. But an image for which the writer of that book was not responsible stood, all the while, clear and immovable in her memory. Before her, in a rude shed, were a boy and a girl. The girl had a basket in her hand, filled with chips, which she had raked from the sawdust; the boy was offering her assistance; but he knew well enough there was no wood to be sawn or split. It was growing dark and cold within the house, and still more dismal without it. The hearts of these two are warmer than their hands.

'I've done it,' said the boy. 'I brought my books home last night, Josey, and I'm going to my uncle in the morning.'

'What did he say?'

'He wouldn't say a word. It was my choice, and I must stand by it,' he answered. 'It's for my mother! If I had only you, and was working for you, I would take the other track. But, you see, it is for her; and I'm her only son.'

'You will be August Scheffer, whatever you may do,' she said, in a soft, sweet voice.

–And did August Scheffer ever stand for less among powers and places, than when, in the darkening wood shed, he spoke these words:

'But, Josey, will things always be the same with us?'

–Things had changed, indeed. The whole world had changed since then. Had the changing world rolled in between them? Since then the widow Mitchell had worked her way out of the worst of her distresses. Josephine had become a beautiful woman. Paul was striding on toward a profession. The family had removed to one of those box-like dwellings opposite the college grounds, and the fair face of Mrs. Mitchell's daughter was the theme of many a student's dreaming—of Harry Cromwell's, most conspicuous among students—of his dreaming, day and night. It was his book she held.

III

It happened, of course, that Paul dropped into Scheffer's shop the next day. August was on the lookout, and conducted him forthwith into a quiet corner. The books were there delivered, but the package remained unopened. Scheffer had his reasons. He wanted leisure to examine them—above all, privacy. He also saw, or thought he saw, that Paul was in haste to be gone; and there was something on his mind of which he desired to be free.

Paul was only disturbed about a proposal he wished to make to Scheffer.

He was electrified when Scheffer himself broached the subject, and transacted it half, at a stroke, though all unconsciously, by asking:

'What has become of Hal Cromwell? He took so many prizes last year.'

Paul's eyes brightened strangely, his whole countenance became luminous. Scheffer surveyed the change as if it were not half agreeable to him. 'Harry is here yet, but he won't be long. That's a secret, though. He's going to France. Guess how.'

'In a balloon, I suppose. He hasn't any money.'

'No,' said Paul, half offended at the tone in which this was spoken. 'He's going to work his passage. He's one of the fellows who can do without money.'

'Indeed!' said Scheffer.

Paul went on: 'He hasn't more than twenty dollars. He sold all his prizes long ago.'

'Is he going to travel?' asked Scheffer, quietly.

'Travel! no. Not yet awhile, I mean. He's mad, just now, on minerals and geology. He's going to school in Paris, where he can learn all about such things. Then he's going to hunt up specimens for cabinets; then he'll be sending curiosities over here by the ship load. If any one wanted to speculate, he'd pay an enormous interest on the money lent him. But catch him asking the loan of a threepenny bit of any man! You know him.'

'Yes,' he said; 'we've had many a rough day together. About the time his father got into trouble, my father did more than one good turn for him. But that's neither here nor there.'

'Yes, it is,' said Paul, quickly; 'if your father helped his father, it's a token that you will help him.'

Scheffer was not so clear on that point: his reply might have chilled Paul's enthusiasm, could anything have done that.

'I can tell you what, Mitchell,' he said, 'I don't wonder at Cromwell, and I don't blame him. I believe it's better to go hungry on your own earnings than full fed at another man's expense. One can starve at home with a better grace than he can among strangers. That's my mind. It mayn't be his.'

'It's mine, though,' said Paul. 'If I had the money—if I had a hundred dollars, I should insist on his taking them. I wish my mother had put me to a trade: it's all nonsense, this slaving for the sake of position—what you call it.'

'Don't talk so,' said Scheffer. 'If Harry Cromwell wants anything of me, I should be ashamed of him if he wouldn't ask it. As to wishing that you had a trade, if there's a mechanical turn in you, you'll twist into it yet. But I don't believe there is. Go on as you have begun. It will all come out right.'

Paul scanned the fine face of the speaker in a spirit of inquiry unguessed of August. He was thinking of Josephine, and of her words. Then he said, 'So you always say. But I can't see it. If I could, then I'd be a philosopher like you. Do you mean I should speak to Harry?'

Scheffer hesitated.

'I see him every day,' said he. 'Sometimes he comes in here. Don't you think he would be better pleased if it should happen of itself, you know—not as if we had talked over his affairs. He is such a proud fellow.'

Paul readily acceded to this plan. He told Josephine what he had done, and she worked on with a lighter heart. She was thinking of Scheffer. How slowly he had grown up into her sight again! Man and woman, if they looked at each other now, must it be across a great gulf? What had education done for her! Could she thank the teaching that had brought her to see in her womanhood something beyond the reach of a man like Scheffer? Could she thank the culture that gave her a position for which nature and habits like his were all unfit? This maturity seemed unnatural to the heart of that remembered childhood, which, in its brave, loving generosity, could trust a boy to any work or station, feeling that in the workman would be securely lodged himself.

Even more than she suspected, Josephine had been moved by the secret Paul had confided to her—of Scheffer's new ambition. No new ambition was it, she could testify. In the fulness of time the bud had come to flower, and on the same stem fair fruits were ripening.

And now, it was he who would relieve her of the anxiety she felt on Cromwell's behalf. She kept these things in her heart.

IV

Cromwell strolled into Scheffer's shop within the week. When Scheffer saw him coming, he satisfied himself at a glance that the visit was an unsuggested one.

There was only one other person in the world whose appearance within his doors could so much disturb the master of the place as Harry Cromwell's. That one was Josephine. Let her but come, and it was a day indeed.

But the disturbance created by her presence was very different from that excited by the entrance of this student. He, inadvertently, or otherwise, and it mattered not which, set Scheffer's heart into such a fume of jealousy, as perhaps the heart of philosopher never knew before. For, it was generally supposed among those who were interested in the affairs transacted on the point of space occupied by these people, that Cromwell's ambition was less undefined than that of young men generally. In short, that he was already, though alone in the world, burdened in mind with family cares—looking upon himself, even then, as the oldest son of the widow Mitchell.

He had said frankly, that he could not afford to give so much of his life to preparatory study as would be required if he chose any one of the professions open to him. He must go to work in some direction where the rewards of labor were sooner obtained.

When Cromwell came into the shop, August advanced to wait upon him. Cromwell was in a cheerful mood. He stretched his hand across the counter, and shook hands with his old acquaintance, as if he were thinking of days when the little white house of Daniel Scheffer stood between two cottages, occupied respectively by families of equal poverty and condition—the Cromwells and the Mitchells.

It wasn't often that they met in these days, he said; and he looked about him with a sort of surprise not disagreeable to Scheffer, for there was nothing offensive in it. Scheffer was always ready to make allowance for the little vanities and weaknesses of others. He was not surprised that Cromwell, handsome as he was, and brilliant intellectually, as he was proving himself to be, should overlook old times and old friends. Present times, and cares, and neighbors, would, of course, engage him to the neglect of what was past and gone.

'Prospering as usual!' said Harry, 'How do you manage it, August? for I am going to launch out into the world, and I can't expect to succeed more suddenly than you have.'

August answered, taking the praise as if it were well meant, and he knew it was well earned:

'By sticking to a thing, when I have made up my mind it is best. It's the only way I know of, Harry. I thought, from all I had heard, that you had found that out.'

'Don't trust report. I've done little yet to satisfy a man; got a few prizes; what do you suppose I care for them?'

'You care for what they mean to other folks,' said Scheffer.

'Not much, I assure you. A little praise, like music, is pleasant. But a man can't live on sound. Show me your seven-league boots, Scheffer; I'm going to take a stroll around the world.'

'What do you mean?' asked Scheffer, without moving.

'I'm going over the ocean.'

'India rubber soles?' asked Scheffer, again speaking in his quietest manner, but really feeling great excitement.

Cromwell laughed. 'I suppose they have iron-bound boots, even in Paris; but I thought I'd like to take something out of your shop with me; something of your own make, if possible. Do you know, Scheffer, you've had more to do with me, a vast deal, than you ever supposed? I've had the feeling that you were watching me as often as ever I got into lazy ways, just as if you stood by that window and searched me out across the grounds, no matter where I was lurking. I shall take my time when I am well rid of you. But I'll have the boots for a token; and when I am tired and sick of my work, as I shall be a hundred times, I'll pretend that you put some magic into the soles. Give them to me with a strong squeak.'

Cromwell laughed, but he was at least two thirds in earnest.

Still August did not stir. 'Are you really going away?' he asked.

'If I'm a live man, next week.'

'Going to France?'

'To France. To Paris for one year. In five years I shall be home again, and I mean to bring with me two or three cabinets of minerals, worth thousands of dollars apiece.'

Cromwell's eyes flashed; they fell on Scheffer, who stood silent, motionless, a cold shiver running over him from his head to his feet.

'What, then, brave fellow?' asked August. It was well to know the worst, and Harry seemed to be in a communicative mood.

'Why, what are you working for?'

'Because I've nothing else to do,' said Scheffer, with a shrug. 'I hate to be idle.'

'No; you are making your fortune; you'll have a house and a family some day. It's written, a hundred girls would think the chance beyond their desert; or they might think so.'

'Yes; well—I don't want a hundred girls.'

'Nor one, I suppose.'

Behind this idle talk the gravest and sharpest scrutiny was bestowed by each man on his fellow. Both were thinking of Josephine, but neither would name her.

'You're a philosopher, Paul says,' continued Cromwell. 'Paul is always talking about you. I don't like to leave that boy; but knowing that you are his friend should make me comfortable. Beside, I couldn't do anything for the lad, if he stood in need of a ten-penny bit.'

Cromwell laughed, but not in recklessness—in pride.

'How can you afford to travel, then?' asked Scheffer.

'Oh, I shall go as some other good fellows have gone—on foot; for I shall work my passage, and get somehow from Havre to Paris.'

'What next?'

'Hard work, you know.'

'Yes; I know what hard work means. But do you? Such hard work as this will be?'

'Do you take me for a dunce? Of course I know; and I shall tell you how I did it, five years from now.'

Then Scheffer said, not hesitating—for anything like a doubtfulness of manner on his part would have defeated his design:

'I want to invest some money, Harry. Take a couple of hundred for me, and buy some of the specimens; or find them, if you like that better. You shall sell them, when you get back, and pay me a percentage, whatever you can afford.'

There was no delay in the answer. It had all the readiness, and the sound, of sincerity.

'Sooner from you, August, than from any other man; but not from any man. I should feel that I was mortgaged. I must begin my own master, as I told Josephine Mitchell. What I bring to her shall be fruit from the tree of my own planting.'

August, for a moment, was like a man struck dumb; but when he spoke, he was the philosopher again.

'That's all foolishness,' he said, in a gentle voice; but there was no tenderness in it: it was but the firmness of self-control that made the voice so mild, and the expostulation, so deliberate. 'It's like using an old tool, when you have a new invention that would save half the labor. You'd laugh at a man for that.'

'Laugh away! But I must go out my own man, Scheffer. You'd do the same thing. Don't talk about it. Have you any of those boots I asked for?'

Scheffer found a pair. He named the price. Cromwell paid for them, and shook his hand when they separated; for, in the press of business, he said, it might be he should not find time to call on his old friend again.

The young men did not meet again. But a fortnight after Cromwell sailed, Scheffer was called upon to pay a note at the bank; a note that bore his own signature, and stated that, for 'value received, I promise to pay to the order of Henry Cromwell, four hundred dollars.'

The demand was made in such a manner, and at such a time, as to vex Scheffer to the utmost.

Cromwell, it seemed, could not consent to accept a favor at his hands; yet he could condescend to make that manner of use of him! He paid the sum due on the note, but at the same time was beset by a sore temptation.

This was the temptation, and this his resistance: If Harry had gone, leaving anywhere, in any woman's heart, a hope in him, should he not dispel it? Should he not convince her that it rested on a foundation looser than the sand? He did not do so! When Paul spoke now and then of Cromwell, and prophesied proudly of him, August took the words as an echo of Josephine's thought, and said to himself:

'Oh! well; it makes no difference.'

But, for all that, he kept on with his studies, and sometimes on Sunday would walk past the college grounds on Monumental square; for that was also walking past the cottage occupied by Josephine.

V

The college, in those days, could have produced no student more industrious than August.

He advanced with rapid strides through the elementary books, for he chose to begin at the beginning, and he was proud of his progress. But he kept his studies secret. He would risk nothing by reporting his own progress. No man should honor his future to the prejudice of his past. The story of Minerva, born to the prerogatives of wisdom, was more attractive to him than that life which 'grew in grace, and in favor with God and man.'

He had no plans in reference to future studies. His tutor was fairly puzzled; for he was not long in discovering that it was not the delight of knowledge, but the ends which knowledge may serve, that prompted to such industry.

One evening Paul threw himself on one of the red-plush sofas Scheffer had transferred to his private apartment. He was in one of those serious moods that had become frequent since Cromwell went away; or, rather, since he had come into this near relation with a working and prosperous man.

'It's easy enough to be poor for one's self,' said the anxious youngster; 'but whether one ought to be poor, when money is to be honestly made, and at only a trifling risk, though by desperate hard work—that's the question.'

'H'm!' said Scheffer.

'Well,' said Paul, irritated by his seeming indifference, 'a fellow is in a deuced bad plight, if he has to plead poverty, when he ought to be able to help one or two beside himself! I envy you, Scheffer. I envy you every time I come here. You can do so much! You could leap all the college gates in no time, if you were fool enough to try.'