"My ignorance was better. Such knowledge isn't good for me."
"Forgive me, my dear old friend," Nick kept it bravely up. "When you're better you'll see it differently."
"I shall never be better now."
"Ah no," Nick insisted; "it will really do you good after a little. Think it over quietly and you'll be glad I've stopped humbugging."
"I loved you—I loved you as my son," the old man wailed.
He sank on his knee beside the bed and leaned over him tenderly. "Get better, get better, and I'll be your son for the rest of your life."
"Poor Dormer—poor Dormer!" Mr. Carteret continued to lament.
"I admit that if he had lived I probably shouldn't have done it," said Nick. "I daresay I should have deferred to his prejudices even though thinking them narrow."
"Do you turn against your father?" his host asked, making, to disengage his arm from the young man's touch, an effort betraying the irritation of conscious weakness. Nick got up at this and stood a moment looking down at him while he went on: "Do you give up your name, do you give up your country?"
"If I do something good my country may like it." Nick spoke as if he had thought that out.