CHAPTER V—PETER TREADS THE HEIGHTS
HE walked rapidly back to the rooms. For his bachelor girl play was swiftly, like magic, working itself out all new in his mind, actually taking form from moment to moment, arranging and rearranging itself nearer and nearer to a complete dramatic story. The big scene was fairly tumbling into form. He saw it as clearly as if it were being enacted before his eyes.... Father and daughter—the two generations; the solid Old, the experimental selfish New.
He could see that typical bachelor girl, too. If she looked like Sue Wilde that didn't matter. He would teach her a lesson she would never forget—this “modern” girl who forgets all her parents have done in giving and developing her life and thinks only of her own selfish freedom. It should be like an outcry from the old hearthstone.
And he saw the picture as only a nerve-racked, soul-weary bachelor can see it. There were pleasant lawns in Peter's ideal home and crackling fireplaces and merry children and smiling perfect parents—no problems, excepting that one of the unfilial child.
Boys had to strike out, of course. But the girl should either marry or stay at home. He was certain about this.
On those who did neither—on the bachelor girls, with their “freedom,” their “truth,” their cigarettes, their repudiation of all responsibility—on these he would pour the scorn of his genius. Sue Wilde, who so plainly thought him uninteresting, should be his target.
He would write straight at her, every minute, and a world should hear him!
In the dark corridor, on the apartment door, a dim square of white caught his eye—the Worm's little placard. An inner voice whispered to light a match and read it again. He did so. For he was all inner voices now.
There it was: