"Professor Theophilus? How do you do?" My visitor gave me his business card.

"How do you do?" I glanced at the unfamiliar company logo and put the card in my pocket. "Are you a used textbook buyer?"

My visitor was smiling, but he didn't seem happy. "No, ah, the name's Hittite. Ralph Hittite." When I said nothing, he prompted "Father of Tom Hittite."

Memory snapped into place. "Of course. My student. Please sit down, Mr. Hittite." I offered him coffee, which he refused.

Again the ingratiating smile. "I understand, Professor, that you and Tom had a little disagreement."

"There was no disagreement," I said pleasantly. "He whined a little, but I caught him with the goods."

"The goods?"

"Two pages of his take-home exam were from a 'free term paper' Web site. Another two had been copied from another student in the same course. The conclusion was copied straight from the encyclopedia. Without acknowledgement, of course." I gestured toward my desk. "Would you like to see the essay?"

Mr. Hittite shook his head. "No, that won't be necessary."

"What did you want to talk about?"

"About his — well, about his punishment."

"Good. But he must have told you the university's arrangements. Were you referring to your own?"

"My own?"

"I mean how you're going to punish him. You do want what's good for him."

"Of course, but — "

"I thought so."

"I don't think you understand me, Professor. I wanted to talk to you about your recommendation."

"Mine?" I was taken aback. It hardly seemed my place to tell him how to discipline his son. I only knew that Tom Hittite lived at home and that he had cheated on my take-home exam. Still, his father had asked for my advice, and the least I could do was advise him.

"Well, Mr. Hittite, if my son had been suspended for cheating, I'd tell him that the free ride was over. Until he was readmitted, I'd expect him to get a job and pay room and board — at market rates. I'd also expect him to start contributing to the cost of his education. If acquiring knowledge means so little to a young man that he's willing to plagiarize the work of others, he needs to pay a higher price to learn its worth."

"Professor — I’m afraid I'm not making myself clear. It's your recommendation to the dean that I'm trying to understand."

"Oh, I see," I replied. "Didn't Tom tell you about that? I recommended a one-semester suspension from the university. Of course he also gets an F in the course, but I don't need the dean's OK for that."

Mr. Hittite shook his head. "It just seems all wrong to me."

I nodded. "It does to me, too. Suspension should be automatic."

"That's not what I mean."

"What do you mean?"

"Really, Professor! A one-semester suspension? Isn't that ridiculous?"

"I agree with you," I replied. "When the university was founded, students caught cheating were expelled. That would never happen now. I considered recommending a full-year suspension, but the dean would never go for it."

"Professor, are you telling me that my son's penalty should be even harsher than it is already?"

Suddenly this strange conversation came into focus for me. "Mr. Hittite, are you telling me that his penalty should be even more lenient than it is already?"

"Lenient is hardly the word I would have chosen."

"What do you propose? No suspension, just an F for the course?"

"Not even that."

I was amazed. "An F for the exam but not the course?"

"Why should he receive an F at all? Just have him take the exam over again. Give him a chance to prove himself."

"He did have a chance to prove himself. He proved himself to be dishonest."

"But the purpose of the exam is to find out how well he understands the material, isn't it? And you still haven't found that out."

"That's right — because instead of using his chance to show me, he cheated."

"Shouldn't a young man even have a second chance?"

"He does have a second chance."

"But you said — "

"Mr. Hittite, the second chance is that after Tom's suspension is up, he'll be readmitted to the university on disciplinary probation. He can still get his degree; it will just take him four months longer to earn it. In the course of a whole life, four months is nothing. Honesty is a gain worth many times four months."

Mr. Hittite didn't answer; he merely spread his hands in vexation. I began to see the problem; he simply didn't believe that his son should be held accountable. With such an upbringing, no wonder Tom cheated.

"May I ask what you do for a living, sir?"

"I'm a certified accountant."

"What would happen if an accountant were caught stealing?"

"He'd lose his job. Probably his license. But Tom hasn't stolen."

"He has. He stole credit for the intellectual labor of other people, and he tried to steal a grade."

"That's no big deal."

"I beg your pardon, but it is. Intellectual dishonesty in my vocation is like financial dishonesty in yours. Knowledge is a university's only reason for existence."

"But Tom is just a boy!"

"How old is he — 19?"

"Twenty."

"That is pretty young, isn't it? I suppose you pick out his clothes for him in the morning."

"Don't be absurd."

"Well, no, I guess you wouldn't do that. But you choose his friends for him, don't you? And you tell him when to go to bed."

"Of course not!"

"Why not?"

"For heaven's sake, he's an adult!"

I folded my hands and let what he had just said sink in. He reddened slightly, but wasn't ready to quit.

"I mean he's becoming an adult."

"How does someone become an adult?" I asked.

"By making a lot of mistakes," he answered. "That's what you don't seem to understand, Professor. Didn't you make mistakes when you were young?"

"I certainly did," I smiled. "I started early, too. In childhood."

"There, you see?"

"You, too?"

"Of course!"

I leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes. "I can still remember my first crime. When I was 5 years old, my parents took me to the grocery store and I stole a cherry. I'll never forget what happened next."

"What happened?"

"When my Dad saw what I was chewing, he marched me up to the produce manager and made me confess my crime. The two of them discussed in deep voices whether I should go to jail. Eventually the produce manager said I could 'work off the debt' by taking some empty cardboard crates to the dumpster and shaking the dust from his brooms."

I laughed. Despite himself, so did Mr. Hittite. It was a little tight, but it was a laugh.

"So you pursued a life of crime too?" I asked.

"Yes, but you got off easy," he said. "When I was 10 and my father caught me stealing apples from our neighbor's tree, he took me to the woodshed. We still had woodsheds in my part of the country." We laughed again. "He said it would 'build character.'"

I chuckled. "I guess it did."

"Indeed it did. Yes, indeed."

We were silent for a moment.

"This is what I don't understand, Mr. Hittite. Don't you want your son to have character too?"

He stiffened again. "I'm sure I don't know what you mean."

"But you do. You told a wonderful story just now. But the moral of your story was different than the moral you told me a few minutes earlier. You said then that we become adults by making mistakes, but that's not how you and I became adults. We became adults not through doing wrong but through being held accountable for it."

"As I told you," he said tautly, "I just want what's best for my son."

"What's best for him is what your Dad gave you."

"A 20-year-old is too old to be taken to the woodshed, Professor."

"You're right. But he's not too old for other treatment."

Mr. Hittite continued smoldering. Why couldn't he see the point?

"Did you resent your father for punishing you?" I asked.

"Resent him!" He was offended. "I loved my old man."

"Are you now afraid that your son won't love you?" It was just a shot in the dark.

He stared at me. A full minute passed.

Still stiffly, he said, "So you don't think I should get him off the hook."

"I think you should help keep him on it. For the sake of your love for him."

Another few seconds passed.

"He doesn't know I came here today."

"Are you going to tell him?"

He looked at me, considering. "Maybe not."

Perhaps I had got through to him after all. I knew he'd never tell me.

He stood up abruptly and put out his hand. "Well, thank you."

We shook hands formally, and he left.

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