“I mean he’s accused himself of the theft, you scoundrel!”
“Let him, then! If the shoe fits him, let him put it on!”
“Oh, let him, eh? Yes, and let him beggar himself. Let him try to get his pitiful life-savings back into the safe in time to save you! A man who’ll stand by and let a poor old servant, more faithful than a dog, bankrupt himself to cover up a sneaking crime—a man who’ll pack up and run away—”
“I’ve had enough o’ you!” snarled Hal. He pushed the doctor out into the hall. “Ezra’s admitted it, and gramp wouldn’t believe I did it, even if he saw the money in my hand. Get out now, and if you cross my path again, look out!”
“Young man,” said he, “I sailed harder seas, in the old times, than any seas to-day. I sailed with your grandfather when he was a bucko of the old school, and though we didn’t usually agree and once I nearly shot him, I never knuckled under. Maybe the bullet that just missed cutting off your grandfather’s life is still waiting for its billet. Maybe that’s part of the curse on _you_!”
His eyes were cold steel as he peered at the menacing, huge figure of Hal.
“Be careful, sir,” he added. “Be very careful how you raise your hand against a man like me!”
“If I ever _do_ raise my hand, there’ll be no more threats of shooting left in you!” Hal flung at him. With a sudden flare of rage he pushed old Filhiol through the door and turned the lock. The doctor stumbled, dropped his cane and fetched up against the balustrade of the stairs. Ashen and trembling he clung there a moment. Then he raised his shaking fist to heaven.
“Oh, God,” he prayed, “God, give me power to stamp this viper’s head before it poisons the captain—before it poisons Laura and old Ezra—the town, the very air, the world! God, give me strength to stamp it in the dust!”
Within the room sounded the tread of Hal, going, coming as he growled to himself, packed up his things for flight.
“Aye, go!” thought the doctor. “Go, and devil take you! Go, and if there’s any curse, carry it with you to the end of the world!”
The doctor realized that nothing better than this departure could happen. The boy would undoubtedly come to his end before long in some drunken brawl. Sooner or later he would meet his match; would get killed, or would do murder and would finish on the gallows or in the chair. That over-mastering physical strength, backed by the arrogance of conscious power, could not fail to ruin him.