"Duty?" she raged. "I want happiness. I'm like a hungry woman standing before a window filled with bread. Your duty says, Stay there and starve. But it isn't duty that lets people starve. It's being afraid."
Tait put off all restraint of courtesy. "Oh, I understand your creed. It's the creed of your set. You're not afraid of any risk. You fear nothing but self-sacrifice. Your greatest horror is being bored. But you'll find that there is a worse boredom than you suffer now—the ennui of exile, of ostracism. The very set that practises your theory is the most merciless to those that get found out. It's like a pack of wolves on the chase. The one that falls or is wounded is torn to pieces by the rest, and then they rush on again. I mean to save Harvey from that pack at any cost."
She had no refuge but a prayer. "I implore you not to break my heart."
Tait donned in manner the black cap of a judge. "Such hearts as yours ought to be broken, Mrs. Enslee, for the health of the world. I understand you. I don't blame you. I don't blame your mother in her grave. It was her breeding, as it is yours and that of your pack. You are the people who bring wealth into disrepute. The noise of your revels drowns the quiet charities of the rich who are also good and busy with noble works. I'm afraid of you all. But I don't blame you. I don't blame the criminals, the thieves, madmen; but I fear them. And in all mercy I would mercilessly put them out of the way of doing harm to the peace of the world."
Persis saw that for once appeal could not melt. She said, with resignation: "Then you are my sworn enemy?"
"No," Tait protested, "I would be your friend as far as I safely can. But I love Harvey as a son. I would save him from the fire of perdition, beautiful as it is, bright as it is. And you are the fire."
"And so you will fight me?" Persis faltered.
"To the death!" the old jurist cried, as he got heavily to his feet; "though it breaks Harvey's heart—and your heart—and mine." He staggered weakly and jolted against the divan.