Orde grinned apologetically.

"The kid has set his heart on coaching the team this fall, and he don't
want to go to work until after the season," said he. "I'm just an old
fool enough to tell him he could wait. I know he ought to be at it
now--you and I were, long before his age; but----"

"Oh, shut up!" interrupted Welton, his big body shaking all over with
mirth. "You talk like a copy-book. I'm not a constituent, and you
needn't run any bluffs on me. You're tickled to death with that boy, and
you are hoping that team will lick the everlasting daylights out of
Chicago, Thanksgiving; and you wouldn't miss the game or have Bob out of
the coaching for the whole of California; and you know it. Send him
along when you get ready."




II


Bob Orde, armed with a card of introduction to Fox, Welton's office
partner, left home directly after Thanksgiving. He had heard much of
Welton & Fox in the past, both from his father and his father's
associates. The firm name meant to him big things in the past history of
Michigan's industries, and big things in the vague, large life of the
Northwest. Therefore, he was considerably surprised, on finding the
firm's Adams Street offices, to observe their comparative
insignificance.