Bromley smiled and relighted his pipe.
“You have some queer notions in that narrow old Puritan head of yours, Phil. Don’t you know that humanity is all common?”
“Is it?—from your point of view?”
“It’s the surest thing you know. ‘For a’ that an’ a’ that, a man’s a man for a’ that.’ Big Jim is a diamond; an uncut diamond, I grant you, but the pure quill is there, just the same.”
“Think so? By his own tell he is a spendthrift drunkard and gambler when he has the means to buy or bet.”
“Well, what of that? Does the foolish evil cancel all the wise good? When it comes to that, how many of us have a clean slate? I’m sure I haven’t, for one. How about you?”
Philip was silent for a time, and when he spoke again it was to say, rather complacently: “I think you have seen the worst of me, Harry.”
Bromley smiled again and shook his head. “I’ve seen the best of you, Phil. I’m only fearing the worst.”
“Thanks”—curtly; “you have said something like that before. Make it plainer.”
“I don’t know that I can; or that you’d thank me if I could. It is merely the potentialities, I guess.”