"I'm always ready for that," laughed Mott, "though I'll have to own up that I've got a few cents on hand yet. No, I don't know that I want to borrow any; but I thought you might want a little help in getting rid of that check, and I'd just run over to oblige you. Just pure missionary work, you see." Mott seated himself in the large easy-chair and endeavored to appear at his ease, though to Will it still seemed as if there was something which still troubled his visitor. "I haven't any special check." "That's all right. My 'old man' never has been up to see me since I entered Winthrop, but as I look around at the fellows whose fathers and mothers have been up, I've noticed that they're usually pretty flush right after the old gentleman departs." "Hasn't your mother ever been up?" inquired Will in surprise. "No. Why should she? She hasn't any time to bother with me. She's on more than forty boards, and is on the 'go' all the time. She has to attend all sorts of 'mothers' meetings' too, and I believe she has a lecture also, which she gives." "A lecture?" "Yes. She has a lecture on 'The proper method of bringing up boys.' How do you suppose she ever has any time to visit me?" Mott laughed as if the matter was one of supreme indifference to him, but Will fancied that he could detect a feeling of bitterness beneath it all. For himself, the condition described by the sophomore seemed to him to be incredible. His own relations with his father had been of the frankest and most friendly nature. Indeed, it never occurred to him in a time of trouble or perplexity that there was any one else to whom he so naturally could go as to his own father. Since he had entered Winthrop, however, he had discovered several who were not unlike Mott in their feelings toward their own families; and as Mott spoke he almost unconsciously found a feeling of sympathy arising in his heart for him. Some of his apparently reckless deeds could be explained now. "Mott, you must go home with me next vacation," he said impulsively. "That's good of you, but it's too far off to promise. Say, Phelps, what's become of that man Friday of yours?" "Who's he?" "Schenck." "Oh, he's flourishing." "He's the freshest freshman that ever entered Winthrop. What do you suppose he had the nerve to say to me to-day?" "I can't imagine." "Well, he told me that he thought the Alpha Omega was the best fraternity in college, and that he'd made up his mind to join it." As this was the fraternity to which Mott himself belonged, Will laughed as he said, "Oh, well, don't be too hard with Peter John. He doesn't know any better now, but he'll learn." "That's what he will," replied Mott with a very decided shake of his head. "I thought I'd come over to tell you that the sophomore-freshmen meet is to come off on Saturday afternoon." "Not next Saturday?" exclaimed Will aghast. "Yes, that's the very day." "They told me it wasn't to be for two weeks yet."