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Page 74
"There's no sugar in my end of the deal," said Harvey. "Four years
at college! 'Wish I'd chosen the valet and the yacht!"
"Never mind, my son," Cheyne insisted. "You're investing your
capital where it'll bring in the best returns; and I guess you won't
find our property shrunk any when you're ready to take hold. Think
it over, and let me know in the morning. Hurry! We'll be late for
supper!"
As this was a business talk, there was no need for Harvey to tell his
mother about it; and Cheyne naturally took the same point of view.
But Mrs. Cheyne saw and feared, and was a little jealous. Her boy,
who rode rough-shod over her, was gone, and in his stead reigned a
keen-faced youth, abnormally silent, who addressed most of his
conversation to his father. She understood it was business, and
therefore a matter beyond her premises. If she had any doubts, they
were resolved when Cheyne went to Boston and brought back a
new diamond marquise ring.
"What have you two been doing now?" she said, with a weak little
smile, as she turned it in the light.
"Talking--just talking, Mama; there's nothing mean about Harvey."
There was not. The boy had made a treaty on his own account.
Railroads, he explained gravely, interested him as little as lumber,
real estate, or mining. What his soul yearned after was control of
his father's newly purchased sailing-ship. If that could be promised
him within what he conceived to be a reasonable time, he, for his
part, guaranteed diligence and sobriety at college for four or five
years. In vacation he was to be allowed full access to all details
connected with the line--he had not asked more than two thousand
questions about it,--from his father's most private papers in the safe
to the tug in San Francisco harbour.
"It's a deal," said Cheyne at the last. "You'll alter your mind twenty
times before you leave college, o' course; but if you take hold of it
in proper shape, and if you don't tie it up before you're twenty-three,
I'll make the thing over to you. How's that, Harve?"
"Nope; never pays to split up a going concern. There's too much
competition in the world anyway, and Disko says 'blood-kin hev to
stick together.' His crowd never go back on him. That's one reason,
he says, why they make such big fares. Say, the 'We're Here' goes
off to the Georges on Monday. They don't stay long ashore, do
they?"
"Well, we ought to be going, too, I guess. I've left my business
hung up at loose ends between two oceans, and it's time to connect
again. I just hate to do it, though; haven't had a holiday like this for
twenty years."
"We can't go without seeing Disko off," said Harvey; "and
Monday's Memorial Day. Let's stay over that, anyway."
"What is this memorial business? They were talking about it at the
boarding-house," said Cheyne weakly. He, too, was not anxious to
spoil the golden days.
"Well, as far as I can make out, this business is a sort of
song-and-dance act, whacked up for the summer boarders. Disko
don't think much of it, he says, because they take up a collection
for the widows and orphans. Disko's independent. Haven't you
noticed that?"
"Well--yes. A little. In spots. Is it a town show, then?"
"The summer convention is. They read out the names of the
fellows drowned or gone astray since last time, and they make
speeches, and recite, and all. Then, Disko says, the secretaries of
the Aid Societies go into the back yard and fight over the catch.
The real show, he says, is in the spring. The ministers all take a
hand then, and there aren't any summer boarders around."
"I see," said Cheyne, with the brilliant and perfect comprehension
of one born into and bred up to city pride. "We'll stay over for
Memorial Day, and get off in the afternoon."
"Guess I'll go down to Disko's and make him bring his crowd up
before they sail. I'll have to stand with them, of course."
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