"But you have made a fool of yourself?"
"Yes."
Mr. Houghton sat down again. "Go on," he said.
Maurice reached for a maulstick lying across the table; then leaned over, his elbows on his knees, and tried, with two trembling forefingers, to make it stand upright on the floor. "She's common. She can't prove it's—mine." His effort to keep the stick vertical with those two shaking fingers was agonizing.
"Begin at the beginning," Henry Houghton said.
Maurice let the maulstick drop against his shoulder and sunk his head on his hands. Suddenly he sat up: "What's the use of lying? She's not bad all through." The truth seemed to tear him as he uttered it. "That's the worst of it," he groaned. "If she was, I'd know what to do. But probably she's not lying... She says it's mine. Yes; I pretty well know she's not lying."
"We'll go on the supposition that she is. I have yet to see a white crow. How much does she want?"
"She's only asked me to help her, when—it's born. And of course, if it is mine, I—"
"We won't concede the 'if.'"
"Uncle Henry," said the haggard boy, "I'm several kinds of a fool, but I'm not a skunk. I've got to be decent"