But he came off very well, though the preliminaries were solemn—rather more portentous, he thought, than anything in the dentist’s waiting-room. There was a sort of counter, with bright brass rails, and a ground-glass box with an office-boy inside it. The unprecedented and unbusinesslike apparition of Mrs. May, with a timid request to see Mr. Maidment or Mr. Hurst (one was dead, and the other never came near the place), wholly demoralised the office-boy, who retired upon his supports in the depths of the office. Thence there presently emerged a junior clerk, who, after certain questions, undertook to see if the acting partner were in. Then came a time of stealthy and distrustful inspection on the part of the office-boy, who, having regained his box, and gathered up his wits, began to suspect Johnny of designs on his situation. But at last Johnny and his mother were shown into an inner room, furnished with expensive austerity, where a gentleman of thirty or thirty-five (himself expensively austere of mien) sat at a writing-table. The gentleman asked Mrs. May one or two rather abrupt questions about her dead husband—dates, and so forth—and referred to certain notes on his table after each answer. Then Nan offered him one of three papers which she had been fiddling in her hand since first she passed the street door—her marriage “lines.” “O, ah, yes—yes—of course,” said the gentleman with some change of manner. “Of course. Quite right. Best to make sure—can’t remember everybody. Sit down, Mrs. May. Come here, my boy. So you want to be an engineer, eh?” “Yes, sir, if you please.” He never thought it would be quite so hard to get it out. “Ah. Plenty of hard work, you know. Not afraid of that, are you?” “No, sir.” “How old are you?” “Fifteen next month, sir.” “Get on all right at school? What standard?” “Passed seventh, sir.” Mrs. May handed over her other two papers: a “character” from the schoolmaster and another from the rector. When the gentleman had read them, “Yes, yes, very good—very good, indeed,” he said. “But you’ve not finished learning yet, you know, my boy, if you’re to be an engineer. Fond of drawing?” “Yes, sir.” And Nan May chimed in: “O, yes, sir, very fond.” “Well, if you stick well at your drawing in the evenings, and learn the theory, you’ll be a foreman some day—perhaps a manager. It all depends on yourself. You shall have a chance to show us what you’re made of. That’s all we can do—the rest is for yourself, as I’ve said.” “Yes, sir, thank-you, sir—I’ll try.” And Mrs. May was audibly thankful too, and confident of Johnny. “Very well, it’s settled.” The gentleman rang a bell, and bade the junior clerk “Just send for Cottam.” “I have sent for the foreman,” he went on, “whose shop you will be in. He’ll look after you as long as you behave well and keep up to your work. You won’t see me very often, but I shall know all about you, remember.” And he turned to his table, and wrote.