“So you’re goin’ to flop like a stuck pig, an’ let it go on, are you? Just because you’ve thought somethin’ you’re goin’ to do nothin’. If I’d thought that of you I don’t b’lieve I’d have brought you down here to be a business-man in the city. A fellow that hain’t got the grit to fight for a gal that he wants is likely to make a mighty poor fist of it in fightin’ for a fortune. No, sir; you’re not goin’ to knuckle under while you’ve got a father to egg you on. I don’t say she’s in ev’ry way the gal I’d have picked out for you, but any gal that’ll live up to the best that’s in her is good enough for any man alive. If you care as much for her as you thought you did when I met you in the street that day, that gal is the one for you to tie to, unless she breaks the rope. A man sometimes gets a bad lickin’ in a love-fight, an’ a powerful big scar besides, but both together don’t do him as much harm as backin’ out an’ playin’ coward.” “I’m not a coward, father,” protested Phil, and his eyes flashed as if he meant it. “You don’t mean to be, my boy,” said the old man, with a pat on his son’s shoulder, “but ev’rythin’ in this affair is new to you, an’ you’re in the dark about some things that mebbe look bigger than they are. That sort of thing’ll make cowards out of the best of men, if they give in to it: that’s the reason I’m crackin’ the whip at you.” “I wonder what Mr. Tramlay wants of me,” said Phil, a moment later. “Reckon you’d better go down and find out,” the old man replied. CHAPTER XVIII. THE NEW CLERK. “Your mother’s out, as usual, I suppose,” said Mr. Tramlay to his oldest daughter, as he came home in the afternoon and roamed despondently about the house, after the manner of family men in general when their wives are away. “She isn’t back from her ride yet,” said Lucia. “You know the usual drive always keeps her out until about six.” “I ought to know it by this time, I suppose,” said the merchant, “and I don’t begrudge her a moment of it, but somehow the house is never quite the same when she is out of it.” Lucia looked at her father with a little wonder in her face. Then she laughed, not very cheerfully, and said,-- “Father, do you know that you’re dreadfully old-fashioned?” “I suppose so. Maybe it’s force of habit.”