I could do as I pleased, he said, but he'd advise me to buckle down and learn something about cattle.

It was plain I never would amount to anything in an office.
He laid a yard or two of ticket on the table at my elbow, and on top of that a check for one hundred dollars, payable to one Ellis Carleton.
I took up the check and read every word on it twice--not because I needed to; I was playing for time to think.

Then I twisted it up in a taper, held it to the blaze in the fireplace, and lighted a cigarette with it.
Dad kept his finger-tips together and watched me without any expression whatsoever in his face.

I took three deliberate puffs, picked up the ticket, and glanced along down its dirty green length.

Dad never moved a muscle, and I remember the clock got to ticking louder than I'd ever heard it in my life before.