As I stood by the railing, she observed me coldly once or twice, looking me over, before she thrust her pencil in her abundant hair and sauntered haughtily over to see what I was after. Despite the fact that I informed her who I was, with eyes impersonal as the dawn she replied that she would see if Mr. Gregory could see me ... that at present he was busy with a conference in the adjoining room. I sat and waited ... dusty and derelict, in the spick-and-span office, where hung the old-fashioned steel engravings on the wall, of Civil War battles, of generals and officers seated about tables on camp stools,--bushy-bearded and baggy-trousered. Finally my grandfather Gregory walked briskly forth. He looked about, first, as if to find me. His eyes, after hovering hawklike, settled, in a grey, level, impersonal glance, on me. "Come in here," he bade, not even calling me by name. I stepped inside, trying hard to be bold. But his precision and appearance of keen prosperity and sufficiency made me act, in spite of myself, deprecative. So I sat there by him, in his private room, keying my voice shrill and voluble and high, as I always do, when I am not sure of my case. And, worse, he let me do the talking ... watching me keenly, the while. I put to him my proposition of having my life insured in his name, that I might borrow a thousand or so of him, on the policy, to go to college with.... "Ah, if he only lets me have what I ask," I was dreaming, as I pleaded, "I'll go to England ... to some college with cool, grey mediaeval buildings ... and there spend a long time in the quiet study of poetry ... thinking of nothing, caring for nothing else." "No! how absurd!" he was snapping decisively. I came to from my vision. "My dear Johnnie, your proposition is both absurd and--" as if that were the last enormity--"very unbusinesslike!" "But I will then become a great poet! On my word of honour, I will! and I will be a great honour to the Gregory family!" He shook his head. He rose, standing erect and slender, like a small flagpole. As I rose I towered high over the little-bodied, trim man. "Come, you haven't eaten yet?" "No!" Well, he had a sort of a heart, after all ... some family feeling. Walking slightly ahead, so as not to seem to be in my company, old Grandfather Gregory took me to a--lunch counter ... bowing to numerous friends and acquaintances on the way ... once he stepped aside to a hurried conference, leaving me standing forlorn and solitary, like a scarecrow in a field. I grew so angry at him I could hardly bridle my anger in. "--like oyster sandwiches?" he asked. * * * * * He didn't even wait to let me choose my own food. "Two oyster sandwiches and--a cup of coffee," he barked. While I ate he stepped outside and talked with another friend. * * * * *