Brandon of the Engineers

"While I'm here you'll come over twice a week to report," he resumed.

"And now if there's anything you'd like to ask."

"First of all, I owe you a dollar," Dick remarked, putting the money on

the table. "The pay-clerk wouldn't take it, because he said it would mix

up his accounts. I'm glad to pay you back, but this doesn't cancel the

debt."

"It wasn't a big risk. I thought you looked played out."

"I was played out and hungry. In fact, it took me five minutes to make up

my mind whether I'd pay the agent who gave me your address his fee,

because it meant going without a meal."

Fuller nodded. "Did you hesitate again, after you knew you'd got the

job?"

"I did. When we were hustled on board the steamer, there was nobody at

the gangway for a few moments and I felt I wanted to run away. There

didn't seem to be any reason for this, but I very nearly went."

"That kind of thing's not quite unusual," Fuller answered with a smile.

"In my early days, when every dollar was of consequence, I often had a

bad time after I'd made a risky deal. Used to think I'd been a fool, and

I'd be glad to pay a smart fine if the other party would let me out. Yet

if he'd made the proposition, I wouldn't have clinched with it."

"Such vacillation doesn't seem logical, in a man," Ida interposed. "Don't

you practical people rather pride yourselves on being free from our

complexities? Still I suppose there is an explanation."

"I'm not a philosopher," Fuller replied. "If you have the constructive

faculty, it's your business to make things and not examine your feelings;

but my explanation's something like this--When you take a big risk you

have a kind of unconscious judgment that tells you if you're right, but

human nature's weak, and scares you really don't believe in begin to

grip. Then it depends on your nerve whether you make good or not."

"Don't they call it sub-conscious?" Ida asked. "And how does that

judgment come?"

"I guess it's built up on past experience, on things you've learned long

since and stored away. In a sense, they're done with, you don't call them

up and argue from them; but all the same, they're the driving force when

you set your teeth and go ahead."

Ida looked at Dick. "That can't apply to us, who have no long experience

to fall back upon."

"I've only made one venture of the kind, but I've just discovered that it

turned out right."

Fuller smiled. "That's neat." Then he turned to Ida. "But I wasn't

talking about women. They don't need experience."

"Sometimes you're merely smart, and sometimes you're rather deep, but I

can't decide which you are just now," Ida rejoined. "However, I expect

you're longing to get back to the plans."