Tertius C. Marrineal was a man of forty, upon whom the years had laid no bonds.  A large fortune, founded by his able but illiterate father in the timber stretches of the Great Lakes region, and spread out into various profitable enterprises of mining, oil, cattle, and milling, provided him with a constantly increasing income which, though no amateur at spending, he could never quite overtake.  Like many other hustlers of his day and opportunity, old Steve Marrineal had married a shrewd little shopgirl who had come up with him through the struggle by the slow, patient steps described in many of our most improving biographies.  As frequently occurs, though it doesn’t get into the biographies, she who had played a helpful role in adversity, could not withstand affluence.  She bloated physically and mentally, and became the juicy and unsuspecting victim of a horde of parasites and flatterers who swarmed eagerly upon her, as soon as the rough and contemptuous protection of her husband was removed by the hand of a medical prodigy who advertised himself as the discoverer of a new and infallible cure for cancer, and whom Mrs. Marrineal, with an instinctive leaning toward quackery, had forced upon her spouse.  Appraising his prospective widow with an accurate eye, the dying man left a testament bestowing the bulk of his fortune upon his son, with a few heavy income-producing properties for Mrs. Marrineal.  Tertius Marrineal was devoted to his mother, with a jealous, pitying, and protective affection.  This is popularly approved as the infallible mark of a good man.  Tertius Marrineal was not a good man.

Nor was there any particular reason why he should be.  Boys who have a business pirate for father, and a weak-minded coddler for mother, seldom grow into prize exhibits.  Young Marrineal did rather better than might have been expected, thanks to the presence at his birth-cradle of a robust little good-fairy named Self-Preservation, who never gets half the credit given to more picturesque but less important gift-bringers.  He grew up with an instinctive sense of when to stop.  Sometimes he stopped inopportunely.  He quit several courses of schooling too soon, because he did not like the unyielding regimen of the institutions.  When, a little, belated, he contrived to gain entrance to a small, old, and fashionable Eastern college, he was able, or perhaps willing, to go only halfway through his sophomore year.  Two years in world travel with a well-accredited tutor seemed to offer an effectual and not too rigorous method of completing the process of mind-formation.  Young Marrineal got a great deal out of that trip, though the result should perhaps be set down under the E of Experience rather than that of Erudition.  The mentor also acquired experience, but it profited him little, as he died within the year after the completion of the trip, his health having been sacrificed in a too conscientious endeavor to keep even pace with his pupil.  Young Marrineal did not suffer in health.  He was a robust specimen.  Besides, there was his good and protective fairy always ready with the flag of warning at the necessary moment.