his son,
was at a loss.

"I never called ye a thief."

"Yes, you did! Yes, you did!" Edwin nearly shouted now. "You starve
me for money, until I haven't got sixpence to bless myself with. You
couldn't get a man to do what I do for twice what you pay me. And then
you call me a thief. And then you jump down my throat because I spend a
bit of money of my own." He snorted. He knew that he was quite mad,
but there was a strange drunken pleasure in this madness.

"Hold yer tongue, lad!" said Darius, as stiffly as he could. But
Darius, having been unprepared, was intimidated. Darius vaguely
comprehended that a new and disturbing factor had come into his life.
"Make a less row!" he went on more strongly. "D'ye want all th' street
to hear ye?"

"I won't make a less row. You make as much noise as you want, and I'll
make as much noise as I want!" Edwin cried louder and louder. And then
in bitter scorn, "Thief, indeed!"

"I never called ye a--"

"Let me come out!" Edwin shouted. They were very close together.
Darius saw that his son's face was all drawn. Edwin snatched his hat
off its hook, pushed violently past his father and, sticking his hands
deep in his pockets, strode into the street.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

THREE.

In four minutes he was hammering on the front door of the new house.
Maggie opened, in alarm. Edwin did not see how alarmed she was by his
appearance.

"What--"

"Father thinks I've been stealing his damned money!" Edwin snapped, in
a breaking voice. The statement was not quite accurate, but it suited
his boiling anger to put it in the present tense instead of in the past.
He hesitated an instant in the hall, throwing a look behind at Maggie,
who stood entranced with her hand on the latch of the open door. Then
he bounded upstairs, and shut himself in his room with a tremendous bang
that shook the house. He wanted to cry, but he would not.

Nobody disturbed him till about two o'clock, when Maggie knocked at the
door, and opened it, without entering.

"Edwin, I've kept your dinner hot."

"No, thanks." He was standing with his legs wide apart on the hearth
rug.

"Father's had his dinner and gone."

"No, thanks."

She closed the door again.

VOLUME TWO, CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

THE SEQUEL.

"I say, Edwin," Maggie called through the door.

"Well, come in, come in," he replied gruffly. And as he spoke he sped
from the