“‘You believe that I have profited by this dirty business, you think that my own hands are not clean?’ he cried out suddenly, and waited a long minute for some one to answer.
“In every group there is always at least one man of a certain type, hard, inflexible, strict with himself, and merciless to others. Robert Kirby was the man of that sort in our company that day. He sat at the opposite end of the table from me, and I had watched him nervously as he turned his little sharp eyes on Jack and never moved them from his face. By some terrible mischance it was he who found words first.
“‘After all you have said,’ he declared in his cutting voice, ‘it would be hard for any of us to believe otherwise.’
“Jack wheeled to your father and faced him, not with a question, but an accusation.
“‘You believe it too!’ he cried.
“Your father is slow of speech at best and he was excited and upset. He voiced his faith in his brother, but he spoke a second too late.
“‘You all of you believe it, every one. It is because your eyes are as blind as the dollars you are always counting.’
“He turned so quickly to the door that no one could stop him. I was the only one that managed to move as he flung it open.
“‘Not I.’ With all my strength I called it after him as I stood up in my place at the end of the table. ‘Oh Jack, not I!’
“But the door had slammed so quickly that I think he did not hear.