"How much will you take to go?" 

 Again the crackling, colorless query, by its chill strength narrowing even the thought which must transpire in the presence of the speaker. 

 "How much will I take to go?" repeated Danny. "How much what? To go where?" 

 Lenox senior blinked, and his face darkened. His voice lost some of its edge, became a trifle muffled, as though the emotion he had breathed hard to suppress had come up into his throat and adhered gummily to the words. 

 "How much money—how much money will you take to go away from here? Away from me? Away from New York? Out of my sight—out of my way?" 

 Once more the fingers pressed the table top and the fighting jaw of the gray-haired man protruded slowly as the younger drew nearer a faltering step, two—three, until he found support against the table. 

 There across the corner of the heavy piece of furniture they peered at each other; one in silent, mighty rage; the other with eyes widening, quick, confusing lights playing across their depths as he strove to refuse the understanding. 

 "How much money—to go away from New York—from you? Out of your way?" 

 Young Danny's voice rose in pitch at each word as with added realization the strain on his emotions increased. His body sagged forward and the hands on the table bore much of its weight; so much that the elbows threatened to give, as had his knees. 

 "To go away—why? Why—is this?" 

 In his query was something of the terror of a frightened child; in his eyes something of the look of a wounded beast. 

 "You ask me why!" 

 Lenox senior straightened with a jerk and followed the exclamation with something that had been a laugh until, driven through the rage within him, it became only a rattling rasp in his throat. 

 "You ask me why!" he repeated. "You ask me why!" 

 His voice dropped to a thin whisper; then, anger carrying it above its normal tone: 

 "You stand here in this room, your face like suet from months and years of debauchery, your mind unable to catch my idea because of the poison you have forced on it, because of the stultifying thoughts you have let occupy 

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