Thor was willing that his father should say, "It's the girl!" but he contented himself with the curt statement: "I'm sorry, Thor; but you can't have the lease. I'm going to sell the place."
"But, father," the young man cried, "what's to become of Fay?"
"Isn't that what you asked me just now about Len Willoughby? Who do you think I am, Thor? Am I in this world to carry every lame dog on my back?"
"It isn't a question of every lame dog, but of an old tenant and an old friend."
"Toward whom I have what you're pleased to call a moral responsibility. Is that it?"
"That's it, father—put mildly."
"Well, I don't admit your moral responsibility; and, what's more, I'm not going to bear it. Do you understand?"
Thor felt himself growing white, with the whiteness that attended one of his surging waves of wrath. He clenched his fists. He drew away. But he couldn't keep himself from saying, quietly, with a voice that shook because of his very effort to keep it firm: "All right, father. If you don't bear it, I will."
He was moving toward the door when Archie called after him, "Thor, for God's sake, don't be a fool!"
He answered from the threshold, over his shoulder, "It's no use asking me not to do as I've said, father, because I can't help it." He was in the hall when he added, "And if I could, I shouldn't try."