at the necessity of
manhandling him would be the final touch in this degrading interview.

"You value your society too high, my dear boy," said Surface with a face
of chalk. "You want too big a price. I must fork over every penny I
have, to a young trollop who happens to have caught your fancy--"

"Stand away from me!" cried Queed, with a face suddenly whiter than his
own. "You will tempt me to do what I shall be sorry for afterwards."

But Surface did not budge, and to strike, after all, was hardly
possible; it would be no better than murder. The two men stood, white
face to white face, the two pairs of fearless eyes scarcely a foot
apart. And beyond all the obvious dissimilarity, there appeared a
curious resemblance in the two faces at that moment: in each the same
habit of unfaltering gaze, the same high forehead, the same clean-cut
chin, the same straight, thin-lipped mouth.

"Oh, I see through you clearly enough," said Surface. "You're in love
with her! You think it is a pretty thing to sacrifice me to her,
especially as the sacrifice costs you nothing--"

"Stop! Will you force me in the name of common decency--"

"But I'll not permit you to do it, do you hear?" continued Surface, his
face ablaze, his lower lip trembling and twitching, as it does sometimes
with the very old. "You need some discipline, my boy. Need some
discipline--and you shall have it. You will continue to live with me
exactly as you have heretofore, only henceforward I shall direct your
movements and endeavor to improve your manners."

He swayed slightly where he stood, and Queed's tenseness suddenly
relaxed. Pity rose in his heart above furious resentment; he put out his
hand and touched the old man's arm.

"Control yourself," he said in an iron voice. "Come--I will help you to
bed before I go."

Surface shook himself free, and laughed unpleasantly. "Go! Didn't you
hear me tell you that you were not going? Who do you think I am that you
can flout and browbeat and threaten--"

"Come! Let us go up to bed--"

"Who do you think I am!" repeated Surface, bringing his twitching face
nearer, his voice breaking to sudden shrillness. "Who do you think I am,
I say?"

Queed thought the old man had gone off his head, and indeed he looked
it. He began soothingly: "You are--"

"I'm your father! Your _father_, do you hear!" cried Surface. "_You're
my son--Henry G. Surface, Jr.!_"

This time, Queed, looking with a wild sudden terror into the fla