He turned from the machine. His face was strangely colorless, strangely drained of all light. She did not speak, but the loyalty and faith deepened in her eyes. Perhaps he gained some comfort from their steady gaze, his tenseness seemed to relax, his arms fell to his sides.
Suzanna unable to stand the strain longer, flew to him and put her small arms tight about him. "Oh, are you sick, daddy?" she cried, tears in her voice.
He hesitated, looked down at her, and said simply, very quietly:
"Suzanna, you might as well know the truth now as later. My machine is a failure—I am a failure!"
Her heart leaped sickeningly, her arms fell from about him. In all her life she had never lived through so intense an emotion. Her father, the Great Man, proclaimed himself a failure in tones which struck through her.
The mother's voice rang out clear. "Richard, you cannot say that." She looked about the attic made sacred by its high use, "Here while you worked we all, your children and I, have learned great lessons. You're looking at your machine, an insensate thing, and losing sight of what during its building, you put into the lives of those near to you, living stuff, Richard."
And then Maizie cried out, "Oh, daddy, it's just like being on a mountain top when we're in the attic with you. We'll never, never have to stop coming, will we?"
And Suzanna, still deeply troubled, cried: "Daddy, how could the machine be a failure when it was born because you loved all men, and wanted to make them happy? And the very thought of it up here made me happy. Why, in school on Monday I'd look down all the shapes of the week, and think of Saturday afternoon and wish it would come quick." Her voice broke and the sobs came uncontrollable, shaking the slender body. In a moment she was clasped tight in her father's arms.
After she had regained some composure she looked up at him. "It hurts me, daddy, so that I can't breathe when you forget that you're a Great Man."
A silence fell, and into it plunged a voice. "Good evening," it said.