Then Queed threw the last thing that he had to offer into the scales, namely himself. He leaned over the table and fixed the old man with imploring eyes.
"I'd do my best to make it up to you. I'll—I'll live with you till one or the other of us dies. You'll have somebody to take care of you when you are old, and there will never be any talk of the poorhouse between you and me. It can all be arranged quietly through a lawyer, Professor—and nobody will guess your secret. You and I will find quiet lodgings somewhere, and live together—as friends—live cleanly, honorably, honestly—"
"For God's sake, stop!" said Surface, in a broken-voice. "This is more than I can bear."
So Queed knew that it was hopeless, and that the old man meant to cling to his dishonored money, and let his friend go. He sank back in his chair, sick at heart, and a painful silence fell.
"If I refuse," Surface took up the theme, "it is for your sake as well as mine. My boy, you don't know what you ask. It is charity, mere mad charity to people whom I have no love for, who—"
"Then," said Queed, "two things must happen. First, I must lay the facts before Miss Weyland."
Surface's manner changed; his eyes became unpleasant.
"You are not serious. You can hardly mean to repeat to anybody what I have told you in sacred confidence."
Queed smiled sadly. "No, you have not told me anything in confidence. You have never told me anything until I first found it out for myself, and then only because denial was useless."
"When I told you my story last June, you assured me—"