Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 1 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/78

 there was I but yesterday a regular attendant at that repository of every virtue, Mr. Striker's office!"

"And does Mr. Striker know of your decision?"

Rowland asked.

"Why, sure! Mr. Striker, you must know, is not simply a good-natured attorney who lets me dog's-ear his law-books. He's a particular friend and general adviser. He looks after my mother's property and kindly consents to regard me as part of it. Our opinions have always been as opposite as the poles, but I freely forgive him his zealous attempts to unscrew my headpiece and set it on another way. He never understood me, and it was useless to try to make him. We speak a different language—we're made of a different clay. I had a fit of rage yesterday, when I smashed his bust, at the thought of all the bad blood he had stirred up in me: it did me good and it 's all over now. I don't hate him any more; I'm rather sorry for him. See how you've improved me! I must have seemed to him wilfully, wickedly stupid, and I'm sure he only tolerated me on account of his great regard for my mother. This morning I took the bull by the horns. I picked up an armful of law-books that have been gathering the dust in my room for the last year and a half, and presented myself at the office. 'Allow me to put these back in their places,' I said. 'I shall never have need for them more—never more, never more, never more!' 'So you've learned every thing they contain?' says the great Striker, leering over his spectacles: 'better late than never!' 'I've learned nothing that you can teach me,' I cried. 44