a five-pointed gold medal inscribed Awarded to "Francis Grayson Gregg for Good Conduct, Punctuality and Progress"; he had entered the High School at the head of his year; and he had closed up on Don so nearly that if the elder brother ever tripped on an examination, now, the younger would surely draw up even with him.
"You're wasting too much time reading trash," their father said to Don, one night when he found the boy on a chair before his mother's bookshelves.
"I've finished my lessons, sir," Don pleaded.
"What's that you're taking?"
It was a copy of Reade's "Put Yourself in His Place." Mr. Gregg drew down his shaggy eyebrows at it. "Put it back," he ordered. "That's no book for a boy. It's no book for anyone. Silly trash! Why don't you read something to improve your mind?" It irritated him to find in Don the same sentimental appetite for novels which his unpractical wife had always had. Frankie had none of it. He had inherited his father's brains.
Don put up the book reluctantly and turned to the door. "And you might as well understand now," his father said, "that I can't send you both to the University. And if Frankie proves himself ... better fitted to profit by it, there'll be no favouritism shown .... in the matter.... Do you hear?"
"Yes, sir," Don said, backing out.
His father opened his newspaper with the satisfaction of having performed his parental duties with a stern impartiality; and Don went back rebelliously
