"Oh, the tragedy of it!" he repeated. "No, it is not death that makes the tragedy, it is something else. I can't understand it. Mr. Erskine, I am a just man."
At this I was silent. I could not for the life of me assent to his words.
"Yes, I am a just man," he repeated. "That is, I have tried to be just. I did what was right, too; he ought to have obeyed me. I was his father, and it is the duty of a son to obey a father; besides, I had done everything for him. I sent him to one of the best public schools in England. After that I sent him to the University. I had great plans for him. But he disappointed me. He married the girl I told him he must not marry; he did that which I forbade him to do; therefore I was right in driving him from the house. But it was all of no use; he was my son still."
"Ah, yes! but there is the tragedy of it. He has died feeling that he was not my son, remembering what I said to him. That is the tragedy! Oh, how God Almighty must be laughing at me!"
"Why, don't you believe in God?" he burst forth almost angrily.
"I don't know," I replied. "But if there is a God, He pities you."
He started to his feet and paced the little room while I stood watching him.
"God! how I loved that boy," he broke out, "and he didn't know it!"
"Yes," I said, "that is the tragedy. That is the unforgivable sin."
"Go on," he said. "Say what you want to say."
"Hugh was hungering for your love, just hungering for it; but he didn't believe you cared for him. You ask me to speak plainly, Mr. Lethbridge, and so, at the risk of offending you, I am going to do so. You had your hard-and-fast ideas about life; you worshipped success, position, power, and money; you wanted Hugh to conform to your iron rules and laws, and because he was a live, human boy you tried to crush him."
"Yes! yes! I know." He spoke almost eagerly. "But even now I cannot feel right about it. After all, war is murder. How can I, a Christian man, a believer in the teaching of the founder of Methodism, believe that my son was anything but murdered? After all, is not a soldier a paid murderer? I think if I could only get that right in my mind I should be happier. Look here! Do you honestly believe that Hugh did right?"