Larry let Purdick drop for the remainder of the session; but the under-thought, that he’d been neglecting something, kept trotting along just the same; that, together with the “flop-around,” as he was calling it, of one Ollie McKnight. From something that had been mighty nearly a snob at the beginning of the year, the son of Consolidated Steel was actually thawing down into a human person with decencies and sympathies a good bit like those of other fellows. That word about the Purdicks just now, for example. At the half-past-nine-o’clock dispersal, when the roomful went straggling out by ones and twos, McKnight was still working on his final trig. problem. When he finished it he stretched himself luxuriously in his chair and stuck his hands into his pockets. “Once more I can face Old Figures without batting an eye,” he exulted. Then: “You’re all kinds of a decent chap, Donnie.” “Don’t I know it?” Larry grinned. “But I’m not as decent as I might be. If I were, I’d have looked Purdick up before this time. Maybe he’s sick.” “Still worrying about that poor little rat, are you? I don’t wonder at it, if he’s a friend of yours. He needs somebody to worry for him.” “I wish I could worry to some good purpose, Ollie.” “Money?” said McKnight. “If I had it――yes. I’d like to stake him for his course. Some of the fellows can romp their way through on the work-out track and it doesn’t hurt ’em. Purdy’s got the nerve for it, but that’s about all he has got.” For a long minute McKnight sat trying to balance his pencil, end up, on one finger and apparently giving his entire attention to the accomplishment of the impossible feat. When he spoke again it was to say: “Donnie, once upon a time I was low-down enough to call you a ‘mucker’: you’re not one, but I am.” “I don’t get you,” said Larry, and he meant it. “I can mighty nearly put it into words of one syllable. I’m nineteen years old, Donnie, and up to date I can’t remember that I’ve ever done one single thing for anybody but Ollie McKnight――that is, nothing that has cost me anything.” “Well, perhaps you haven’t had to.” “That’s it; I haven’t. It’s been Dad’s money, ever since I can remember. If I wanted to throw a few dollars to the birds, I threw ’em――and got some more where they came from. It didn’t cost me anything.” “You don’t have to tell me about it,” said Larry, meaning only to save the confider from possible future embarrassment. “Don’t you go and trig the wheels,” McKnight put in quickly. “I’m not often taken this way, and it’ll do me good to unload and get it out of my system. What you said about little Purdy a few minutes ago――that you’d boost him through if you had the money――snagged me good and hard.” “How was that?” McKnight dug into a pocket and fished out a letter. It was typewritten on a Consolidated Steel letterhead, and he folded it over until he came to a paragraph near the end.