“A man must not understand everything. He must choose and judge and reject. If he doesn’t do that, there is no happiness in the world and no loyalty and no peace. And, if he cannot hate, he cannot love either.”
He went to the window and looked out. And, as he stood there, Finn came up to him and seized his hand and looked at him pleadingly:
“I can’t do what you want,” he said.
But Cordt withdrew his hand and moved away from him:
“You have no right to say that to me, Finn. I won’t listen to it. For what I want is only that you should live. Take the inheritance which I have given you and use it as you can. One day, you shall be called upon to answer for your son, as I to-day for you.”
Finn smiled sadly:
“I shall never have a son,” he said, softly.
Cordt did not hear what he said. He was struggling with a memory ... passed his hand over his face and stared before him. He saw Fru Adelheid ... that evening in the old room, when she had said what Finn was saying now ... the same hopeless, impotent words: “I cannot do what you want.”
He sat down and fell back in his chair.
All the despair of the old days came over him like a tremendous weariness. He was struggling against what was stronger than himself. He had nothing to set against that eternal, hopeless, “I cannot do what you want.”