“Mother didn't tell me much,” he said in answer to a question of Clytie's. “I was looking in a chest of drawers of mother's, and I see a photograph--an orficer--all over strings and buttons and a sword and great big moustaches. And I come to mother and says: 'Who's this?' and she says: 'That's your father.' And then she snatched it out of my hand and hit me a clout on the head for going to her drawer. She wouldn't tell me no mere; but I know he was an orficer because he's got a star on his collar. I think I knows orficers when I sees them,” he added, with the ci-devant street urchin's knowledge of life. “And I go and look at him now when mother isn't by.” “But you shouldn't go to your mother's private drawers,” said Clytie by way of moral precept. “I've got as much right to look at my father as she has,” replied Jack in an injured tone, whereat Clytie laughed a little. “You are an odd youth. I wish I could make you an officer right away. But I am afraid I can't.” “I believe you could,” said Jack. There was a world of childish faith in the remark and the manner in which it was delivered. Clytie was both touched and saddened. She regretted that she had raised hopes in the boy that from the nature of things were doomed to disappointment. The overpowering difficulties in the way of her sudden visionary aspirations for Jack's future ranged themselves before her mind. So it was with a sigh she answered his outburst of faith. “I am afraid I can't, Jack,” she repeated. “But you yourself can do a great deal. If you like, one of these days when you are much older, you can enlist in the army, and then throw your soul into your duties, and keep before you at every minute of the day the words, 'I am going to be an officer,' and if you do this intensely, and never lose sight of it, you will succeed. That's the only way. They call it getting a commission through the ranks. But between now and then there are a great many years, and I'll do all I can for you, Jack. Yet, perhaps, after all, you'd be a happier and more useful man as a carver and gilder. Who knows!” Jack did not heed the pessimism of the peroration. His mind was aflame with the possibilities of becoming an officer and he took his leave in high spirits. Clytie sat for a little musing over the solution of the problem that had troubled her in the first days of her acquaintance with Jack. She was gratified at her intuitions having proved correct. But there was still much that was dark to her. The physiological side of the question, however, was shadowed at present by more practical considerations. Why could she not find a means of giving Jack a chance in life? She looked ahead at the years to come, as she often had done since that dark December morning, and a pain came at her heart as she beheld their blankness. And now fate had thrown across her path this drifting spar of humanity. Jack was hers if she chose to claim him. No one would dispute with her the privilege.