Philip’s dull eyes glowed suddenly. “I ought to have had a gun last night!” he broke out savagely. “Those two tinhorns robbed me blind!”
“Of course they did. That is what they were out for. No, wait; I’m not going to preach. I grant you it’s every man’s privilege to go to the devil in his own fashion. Still, I’m a trifle curious.”
Silence for the space of a long minute. Then: “You wouldn’t understand, Harry; I couldn’t make you understand if I should try. Say that the cursed atmosphere of this God-forsaken country got hold of me at last and that I stubbed my toe and fell down. That will cover it as well as anything.”
“A good many of us fall down, but we get up again. Have you got to stay down?”
“It looks that way. I haven’t anything to get up for.”
“Why haven’t you?”
“That question runs you up against a shut door, Harry; a door that I’ll never open for anybody so long as I can keep it shut. Let that be understood, once for all.”
“All right; we’ll let it go at that, if you say so. Just the same——”
“Well?”
“Oh, confound it—you know what I want to say, and can’t Phil! You’ve been more than a brother to me, ever since you picked me up out of the gutter a year ago and stood me on my two feet. Can’t you see where this thing hits me?”