"I am not. It makes me almost afraid of myself," Jack answered.
"Oh, I don't mean firing six-shooters—hardly! I mean backbone," he hastened to add, almost ingratiatingly. "It is a thing to control, Jack, not to worry about."
"Yes, to control!" said Jack, dismally.
He was hearing Ignacio's cry of "The devil is out of Señor Don't Care!" and seeing for the thousandth time Mary's horrified face as he pressed Pedro Nogales against the hedge. Now poise was all on the side of the father, who glanced away from Jack at the glint of the library cases in the semi-darkness in satisfaction. But only a moment did the son's absent mood last. He leaned forward quivering, free from his spell of reflection, and his words came pelting like hail. He was at grip with the phantoms and nothing should loosen his hold till the truth was out.
"Father, I could not fail to see the look on your face and the look on
Jasper Ewold's when you found him in the drawing-room!"
At the sudden reversal of his son's attitude, John Wingfield, Sr. had drawn back into the shadow, as, if in defensive instinct before the force that was beating in Jack's voice.
"Yes, I was startled; yes, very startled! But, go on! Speak everything that you have in mind; for it is evident that you have much to say. Go on!" he repeated more calmly, and turned his face farther into the shadow, while he inclined his head toward Jack as if to hear better. One leg had drawn up under him and was pressing against the chair.
Jack waited a moment to gather his thoughts. When he spoke his passion was gone.
"We have always been as strangers, father," he began. "I have no recollection of you in childhood until that day you came as a stranger to the house at Versailles. I was seven, then. My mother was away, as you will recall. I remember that you did not kiss me or show any affection. You did not even say who you were. You looked me over, and I was very frail. I saw that I did not please you; and I did not like you. In my childish perversity I would speak only French to you, which you did not understand. When my mother came home, do you remember her look? I do. She went white as chalk and trembled. I was frightened with the thought that she was going to die. It was a little while before she spoke and when she did speak she was like stone. She asked you what you wanted, as if you were an intruder. You said: 'I have been looking at the boy!' Your expression told me again that you were not pleased with me. Without another word you departed. I can still hear your steps on the walk as you went away; they were so very firm."
"Yes, Jack, I can never forget." The tone was that of a man racked. "What else?" he asked. "Go on, Jack!"