Enough has been told about Mr. Robert van Rensselaer's early period to
indicate how those pleasant days were passed. Including the suite, the
flat, and the clubs, the automobile, the yacht, and the polo stud, our
friend's total expenses came to something in the neighborhood of three
hundred thousand a year. And since, if he had been a master-poet, or an
inspired musician, or a prophet with a new message for mankind, society
would have paid about one one-thousandth of that sum to keep him alive,
it is apparent that he was considered by society to be equivalent to one
thousand such hypothetical persons.
This idyllic existence continued for about three years all together; and
then one bright winter day Robbie was invited to pay a call upon his
father at his office, where the two had a long and serious
conversation.
"Now, Robbie," said van Rensselaer senior, "I haven't objected to your
wild oats. That's every young fellow's right, and you haven't gone
beyond the limit. I have always meant to give my son everything a
gentleman ought to have; but now I think it's about time you'd had
enough--don't you?"
"Um-m," said Robbie, meditatively, "I hadn't thought about it."
"You know," said van Rensselaer _pere_, "the life of man isn't all play.
We have some serious duties in the world--we owe something to society."
"Yes," said Robbie, "I suppose so. But it's the hell of a nuisance."
"It may seem so," said the other; "but one can get interested in the
end."
"Perhaps so," admitted Robbie, dubiously.
"What I mean," said the father, "is that it's time you got ready to take
your place in the world. You've seen life pretty much, and you know what
I mean. You can't always be your father's son; you'll have to be
yourself. I may die some day, and then somebody'll have to take over my
affairs. Then, too, you might want to marry; you've wanted to twice
already, you know" (Robbie blushed), "and if you have a family, you'll
find they'll expect from you pretty much what you've had from me. The
life of man, my boy, is a battle; and there comes a time when every one
has to fight it."
Robbie had never known his father to be philosophical before, and found
it a curious experience; their talk was prolonged late into the
afternoon, and by that time Robbie had expressed his willingness to make
an effort to perform some of his duties to society.