Sheila Graham--and what I say _goes_!"

"Not any longer with me!" flared his son at white heat. For a full
minute they indulged in a furious exchange of half-incoherent insults
before Copley's voice rose clear above his father's. "I will marry
Sheila as soon as she'll have me, and I warn you to keep your hands off
Graham!"

It was then that the study door was flung open and a thick, heavy voice
cut through their abusive volleys.

"That will do, young man! I can fight my own battles with no help from
you!"

Graham came into the study, dragging with him the shrinking figure of
the clerk, Langhorn. His intrusion was startling enough, but there was
still a deeper significance in the slight lurch that the manager gave
as he halted, glowering, before Simon Varr. His flushed face and
blurred utterance contributed their testimony to a fact that was
ominous in itself; he had been drinking, drinking heavily, though he
was notably abstemious by habit. Varr got hastily to his feet, so
threatening was his manager's attitude.

"What do you want here?" he demanded curtly, though he knew well enough
what Langhorn's presence betokened. "What do you mean by bursting in
like that? Are you drunk?"

Possibly the crisp question went far to sober Graham, who was plainly
trying to shake off the effect of his potations as if the sense of the
undignified figure he was cutting was just beginning to filter into his
confused brain. He straightened up, steadied himself.

"I want a talk with you, Mr. Varr. It's overdue, I think. I've been
waiting for you to make a move in a certain direction, and it seems
I've been fooling myself nicely." He spoke slowly. "More than a score
of years I've worked for you, Mr. Varr, and not you nor any man can say
I haven't done well by you and the business. I'm entitled to something
more than the salary of a hired hand--Mr. Bolt agrees with me
there--and I've been hoping that you would give me some chance to
invest my savings in a business I've grown up with. I've earned the
right--"

"Stop pinning medals on yourself and come to the point!"

"I've been wondering if maybe you didn't understand how I felt and if I
oughtn't to speak straight out, but yesterday afternoon this man,
Langhorn, told me he had heard you and Mr. Bolt discussing me. He told
me you said you would never give me a partnership, that--that you were
going to throw me out so I would go to Rochester, taking Sheila with
me! It