“Dead—you did it!”
Yes, it was just. No mercy seasoned that justice in the heart of either man. The weaker, self-accusing, sat silent with bowed head, his conscience seconding the words of the stronger. The voice of the elder ran on with growing, terrifying intensity.
“Please stop,” interposed the younger. He rose to his feet. “You are right, Will. You were always right and I was always wrong. I did kill him. But you need not have told me with such bitterness. I realized it the minute you said he was dead. It’s true. And yet I was honestly sorry. I came back to tell him so, to ask his forgiveness.”
“When your money was gone.”
“You can say that, too,” answered the other, wincing under the savage thrust. “It’s as true as the rest probably, but sometimes a man has to get down very low before he looks up. It was that way with me. Well, I’ve had my share and I’ve had my fling. I’ve no business here. Good-bye.” He turned abruptly away.
“Don’t add more folly to what you have already done,” returned William Carstairs, and with the beginnings of a belated pity, he added, “stay here with me, there will be enough for us both and—”
“I can’t.”
“Well, then,” he drew out of his pocket a roll of bills, “take these and when you want more—”
“Damn your money,” burst out John Carstairs, passionately. He struck the other’s outstretched hand, and in his surprise, William Carstairs let the bills scatter upon the floor. “I don’t want it—blood money. Father is dead. I’ve had mine. I’ll trouble you no more.”
He turned and staggered out of the room. Now William Carstairs was a proud man and John Carstairs had offended him deeply. He believed all that he had said to his brother, yet there had been developing a feeling of pity for him in his heart, and in his cold way he had sought to express it. His magnanimity had been rejected with scorn. He looked down at the scattered bills on the floor. Characteristically—for he inherited his father’s business ability without his heart—he stooped over and picked them slowly up, thinking hard the while. He finally decided that he would give his brother yet another chance for his father’s sake. After all, they were brethren. But the decision came too late. John Carstairs had stood not on the order of his going, but had gone at once, none staying him.