"Quite time I did," he cried almost sharply. "Look here, father, I don't think you meant all you said the way your talk conveyed it. To me the most important of your talk is the implied immorality of my mode of life. Then the inconsistent fashion in which you point my way towards—big finance."
His eyes lit again. They had suddenly become dangerously bright.
"Here, we're not going to quarrel, nor get angry," he went on, gathering heat of manner even in his denial. "We're too great friends for that, and you've always been too good a sportsman to me, but—but I'm not going to sit and listen to you or anybody else accusing me of immorality without kicking with all my strength!"
He brought one great fist down on the desk with a bang that set the ink-wells and other objects dancing perilously.
"I'm not angry with you. I couldn't get angry with you," he proceeded, with a suppressed excitement that added to his father's smile; "but I tell you right here I'll not stand for it from you or anybody. My only crime is spending your money, which you have always encouraged me to do. From my university days to now my whole leisure has been given up to athletics. A man can't live immorally and win the contests I have won. I don't need to name them. Boxing, sculling, running, baseball, swimming. You know that. Any sane man knows that. The money I've spent has been spent in the ordinary course of the life to which you have brought me up. You have always impressed on me the great position you occupy and the necessity for keeping my end up. That's all I have to say about my debts, but I have something to say on the subject of the inconsistency with which you censure immorality in the same breath as you demand my immediate plunge into the mire of big finance."
He paused for a moment. Then, as abruptly as it had arisen, his heat died down, and gave place to the ready humor of his real nature.
"Gee, I want to laugh!" He sprang from his seat and began to pace the floor, talking as he moved. His father watched him with twinkling, affectionate eyes. "Immorality? Psha! Was there ever anything more immoral than modern finance? You imply I have learned nothing of your organization in the three years I've been one of your secretaries. Dad," he warned, "I've learned enough to have a profound contempt for the methods of big corporations in this country, or anywhere else. It's all graft—graft of one sort or another. Do you need me to tell you of it? No, I don't think so. Twenty-five millions wouldn't cover the fortune you've made. I know that well enough. How has it been made? Here, I'll just give you one instance of the machinations of a big corporation. How did you gain control of the Union Grayling and Ukataw Railroad? Psha! What's the use? You know. You hammered it, hammered it to nothing. You got your own people into it, and sat back while they ran it nearly into bankruptcy under your orders. Then you bought. Bought it right up, and—sent it ahead. Immoral? It makes me sweat to think of the people who must have lost fortunes in that scoop. Immoral? Why, I tell you, Dad, any man can make a pile if he sticks to the old saw: 'Don't butt up against the law—just dodge it.' It's only difficult for the fellow who remembers his Sunday-school days. So far, Dad, I've avoided immorality. I'm waiting till I start on big finance to become its victim. That's my talk. Now you do some."
His father nodded. Then he said dryly, "This carpet cost me five hundred dollars, that chair fifty. Try the chair."
Gordon laughed at the imperturbable smile on his father's face, but he flung his great body into the chair.
James Carbhoy deliberately knocked the ash from his cigar. It was many years since he had received such a straight talk from any man. Some of it had stung—stung sharply, but the justice or injustice of it he set aside. His whole mind and heart were upon other matters. He took no umbrage. He swept all personal feeling aside and regarded the boy whom he idolized.