erating the facts if I claimed
that! But my intentions are good." Simon's lips lifted. "I want to
get busy at something useful right away."

"Humph. You're just out of college and the general idea has been that
you would take a post-graduate course in the Columbia Law School; that
is your mother's wish. The tannery, if I may so express it, has always
been a stench in her nostrils. She is not the first woman to quarrel
with the honest source of her bread-and-butter." He stared at his son
from beneath level brows. "Well? Have plans changed?"

"I want to make money, sir, and it would be years before I could hope
to do that at the Bar."

"I will undertake to continue your allowance until you have established
yourself."

"Thank you, father, but it's not the same thing. I want to stand on my
own feet--and as soon as possible."

"Why?"

"Because I wish--I intend--to marry Sheila Graham."

"You shan't do it!"

It was the drop of the handkerchief; steel rang upon steel, and no
buttons tipped their foils. It was careful fencing at first, thrust
and parry, parry and thrust, until Simon lost patience at length and
put all his viciousness into one deadly lunge.

"Now, see here, Copley! If you persist in disregarding my wishes let
me tell you what will happen; I will throw Billy Graham out of his job
and I'll use every scrap of influence I possess to keep him from
getting another! Put that in your pipe and smoke it!" The notebook
slapped on his knee. "Ruin your own prospects if you're fool enough to
do it; ruin Sheila's, if she's fool enough to let you; but _stop
there_! Maybe she'll help you to stop when she knows that your
stubbornness and hers will be a knife in her father's back! She _will_
know, too, for you can't go ahead in common decency without telling her
what it will mean to him!" The tanner leaned forward, an ugly light of
triumph in his eyes, raised his free hand and slowly clenched his fist.
"I've got--you--right--_there_!"

"Father!" The bitterest shame in the world, the shame of a son for his
father, was in that cry. The young man rose from his chair and stood
looking at Simon Varr almost incredulously. "You couldn't do _that_!
You couldn't do anything so contemptible! Do what you please to me,
but take back that threat before I--I despise you!"

"Despise me? _You_! Ha! I'll take back nothing, and I'll use my
advantage to its full extent. Mark that! I've said you shan't marry