The boy had made a treaty on his own account.

Railroads, he explained gravely, interested him as little as lumber, real estate, or mining.

What his soul yearned after was control of his father's newly purchased sailing-ships.

If that could be promised him within what he conceived to be a reasonable time, he, for his part, guaranteed diligence and sobriety at college for four or five years.

In vacation he was to be allowed full access to all details connected with the line,--he had asked not more than two thousand questions about it,--from his father's most private papers in the safe to the tug in San Francisco harbour.
"It's a deal," said Cheyne at the last.