If Mr.Hepburn had only offered him employment, how gladly he would have accepted it and declined Thorpe's invitation; but his guardian had merely asked him to recommend some one else.
"Which shows," thought Cabot bitterly, "what he thinks of me, and of my fitness for any position of importance.

He is right, too, for if ever a fellow threw away opportunities, I have done so during the past four years.

And now I am deliberately going to spend another, squandering my last dollar, in company with a chap who will have no further use for me when it is gone.

It really begins to look as though I were about the biggest fool of my acquaintance." It was in this frame of mind that our young engineer made a second visit to his guardian's office on the following morning.

There he was received by Mr.Hepburn with the same business-like abruptness that had marked their interview of the day before.
"Good-morning, Cabot," he said.