"Billy's all right; he's not that bad."

"Oh, I suppose not; but I still think you should have got it.

"I don't seem to quite make the grade, ever." Johnny snapped the stub of his cigarette into the fireplace. "I guess it's the old Mendelian Law at work. "

"Nerts!" scoff.

"No 'nerts' about it. Take your own family for instance: lawyers, writers, statesmen, diplomats, naturalists, astronomers, and two U.S. presidents; and Perry's is almost as good. Your blood can't help producing successes. But how about me? The only Lafitte in history was a pirate, and there isn't any great field for pirates nowadays."

Adams grinned. "You might try international banking."

"Too ruthless for a self-respecting pirate."

"And say, let me tell you something. You're all wet about Perry, and your theory falls down right there. I happen to know something about him. His father may be a respected banker from a fine old family, but his mother's people were not so hot. My father came from the same town she did. Her old man served a term for forgery, and she died in an insane asylum. But there's nothing wrong that way about Billy."

"He's always inventing things," suggested Lafitte, "maybe that explains it."

"I wouldn't mind being crazy like Edison. But on the level, Johnny, you don't believe in all this heredity bunk, do you?"

There was a note of sadness in Lafitte's voice as he replied. "Yes, and so do you. Science may not be able to prove how it is done, but it certainly has proved that it is done-that germ cells carry certain characteristics down through a line for generation after generation, physical, mental, and moral.

"There's the famous Hapsburg lip, for example, that's come down through eighteen generations for more than six hundred years to King Alphonso of Spain; and the musical talent of the Bach family in which there have been twenty-eight famous musicians; the genius and talent of the Darwin family; and Commodore Perry's line, which includes twelve admirals."

Adams grunted. "It'd take a lot more than heredity to make an admiral out of Bill Perry; it's environment and training that count. No, it's all theory; and theories mostly don't work out. If a man believed the way you do, there'd be no incentive for him to try to make anything of himself. I won't believe it; it's rotten."

"I'd rather not believe it, but I can't help it."

"But think what it means to some people; it's ghastly. Think what it would mean to-" He paused a moment, and then barely whispered the name. "Daisy."

"I have thought of her more than of anyone else."

Adams rose and walked to the window. "It's a horrible theory; it takes all hope from life. What chance would she have with that blood line back of her--the blood of old Max Juke that has produced over twelve hundred physical, mental, and moral wrecks, paupers, prostitutes, thieves, murderers, and other criminals during the past two hundred years? I tell you it was environment that made those people the way they were. Her family got out of that environment; she's not contaminated."

"I hope you're right, old man; but only time will tell; and maybe not in this generation."

Chapter 1 Speed Cap

EDUCATION IS ALL RIGHT, BUT THERE OUGHT TO BE SOME way to pick out the ones who will be able to do something with an education after they get it instead of wasting a lot of time and money trying to make purses out of sows' ears.

I am a college graduate; but as far as I can see it has never done me any good, nor ever will. It hasn't even taught me the proper way to write my autobiography; so if it doesn't stack up with your preconceived notions of what an autobiography should be don't blame me-you shouldn't expect a sow's ear to write classical literature.

If you feel that you must blame someone, blame Mr. McCulloch; it was he who persuaded me to attempt this unaccustomed and unpiratical task during a chance meeting in Singapore; so here goes.

There is nothing in my early life of sufficient interest to record. I lived in a small town; I went to the public schools; I worked my way through college. My father, Louis Lafitte, was a poor man, a cobbler.