-But
Madeline's mother died, you know, when she was a baby. Her father--well,
you and I talked that over just the other day--there's no getting to
him. Fred never worried me a bit--just the fine normal boy. But
Madeline--(_with an effort throwing it off_) Oh, it'll be all right, I
haven't a doubt. And it'll be all right between you and me, won't it?
Caution over a hard strip of the road, then--bigger things ahead.

HOLDEN: (_slowly, knowing what it may mean_) I shall continue to do all
I can toward getting Fred Jordan out of prison. It's a disgrace to
America that two years after the war closes he should be kept
there--much of the time in solitary confinement--because he couldn't
believe in war. It's small--vengeful--it's the Russia of the Czars. I
shall do what is in my power to fight the deportation of Gurkul Singh.
And certainly I shall leave no stone unturned if you persist in your
amazing idea of dismissing the other Hindus from college. For what--I
ask you? Dismissed--for _what_? Because they love liberty enough to give
their lives to it! The day you dismiss them, burn our high-sounding
manifesto, Mr Fejevary, and admit that Morton College now sells her soul
to the--committee on appropriations!

FEJEVARY: Well, you force me to be as specific as you are. If you do
these things, I can no longer fight for you.

HOLDEN: Very well then, I go.

FEJEVARY: Go where?

HOLDEN: I don't know--at the moment.

FEJEVARY: I fear you'll find it harder than you know. Meanwhile, what of
your family?

HOLDEN: We will have to manage some way.

FEJEVARY: It is not easy for a woman whose health--in fact, whose
life--is a matter of the best of care to 'manage some way'. (_with real
feeling_) What is an intellectual position alongside that reality? You'd
like, of course, to be just what you want to be--but isn't there
something selfish in that satisfaction? I'm talking as a friend now--you
must know that. You and I have a good many ties, Holden. I don't believe
you know how much Mrs Fejevary thinks of Mrs Holden.

HOLDEN: She has been very, very good to her.

FEJEVARY: And will be. She cares for her. And our children have been
growing up together--I love to watch it. Isn't that the reality? Doing
for them as best we can, making sacrifices of--of _every_ kind. Don't
let some tenuous, remote thing destroy this flesh and blood thing.

HOLDEN: (_as one fighting to keep his head above water_) Honesty is not
a tenuous, remote thin