The house in Liverpool where Uncle Henry had made his fortune was by no means a great house. It had gone on very steadily since the old man retired from it, and now there was a need for new blood. Harry had explained all this when he went to see his uncle, and had done all that was possible to do short of asking for the money to show to Uncle Henry how highly expedient it was to “come forward” on such an occasion. But the old gentleman had not taken the hint. And then Harry had spoken to his mother, urging her to make an effort to get her own little fortune, if possible, from his father’s hands, and invest it in the business. To get it from his father’s hands! it would have been as easy to get him the moon out of the skies. Mrs. Joscelyn would have set out on any journey, would even have consented to be shot out of a big cannon, like the hero of M. Jules Verne, in order to get her boy what he wanted. But get it from his father! She sank back upon herself at the mere suggestion. Nothing in heaven or earth was less possible. Then Harry had taken it in hand himself. He was not one who had ever “got on” with his father. Notwithstanding his long absence from home, as soon as they met it seemed that they could not avoid jangling. An impulse to contradict everything his father said seemed somehow the first thing in Harry’s mind; and Joscelyn himself, always dogmatical, was never so much so, never so impatient of any expression of opinion as when it was his youngest son who made it. It may be imagined then if Mrs. Joscelyn had reason for her alarm when Harry at last took the bull by the horns, as he said, and ventured to propound to his father the tremendous idea that he wanted money. The young man was a little alarmed by it himself. He took the bull by the horns with a weak rush at last, his mind so deranged by the traditions of the house and the alarming presence of his father, that his appeal was quite wanting in the business-like form he had intended to give it. What he meant to say was, that here was an excellent opportunity for investing a little money, that it would bring in good interest, and would be perfectly safe, and would give him a great step in life--all these things together. But instead of this he blundered and stumbled, and gave his father to understand that his mother was quite willing and anxious that her money should be employed in this way, and that the return would be far better if it were put into his hands than any other possible use of it could give. “So you’ve been plotting with your mother,” Joscelvn had said. “What the blank has she to do with it? What the dash does she mean by interfering? I’ve a good mind to kick you out of the house--both her and you.” “It is her money,” said Harry, confronting his father; though, indeed, had it not been for necessity and opposition the idea of anything belonging to his mother was the last thought that would have occurred to him.