A
human being, even one born of the artificial state called civilization,
isn't a contrivance like a typewriter which you can make work and then
shut up in a box until it is wanted again. There are certain emotions,
certain wants, you can't suppress by logic. Even a dog, if you imprison
him alone, will go mad in time. I'm a living man, with red blood instead
of ink in my veins, not an abstract mathematical problem. I've had my
full share of work and unhappiness. You'll have to give me a better
reason for remaining without the gate of the promised land than you've
yet done."

Hough looked at the speaker impotently. "You misunderstood me, Chad, if
you thought I was trying to keep you from your due, or from anything
which would really make for your happiness. I was simply trying to
prevent something I feel morally certain you'll regret. Because one
isn't entirely happy is no adequate reason why he should make himself
more unhappy. I can't say any more than I've already said; there's
nothing more to say. My best reason for disapproving your contemplated
action I gave you first, and you've not considered it at all. It's the
injustice you do to a girl who doesn't realize what she is doing. With
your disposition, Chad, you'd take away from her something which neither
God nor man can ever give her back--her trust in life."

Sidwell's long fingers restlessly twirled the glass before him. The
remainder of the untouched beer was now as so much stagnant water.

"If I don't undeceive her someone else will," he said. "It's inevitable.
She'll have to adjust herself to things as they are, as we all have to
do."

Hough made a motion of deprecation.

"Miss Baker is no longer a child," continued Sidwell. "If you've studied
her as you say you've done, you've discovered that she has very definite
ideas of her own. It's true that I haven't known her long, but she has
had an opportunity to know me well such as no one else has ever had, not
even you. No one can say that she is leaping in the dark. Time and time
again, at every opportunity, I have stripped my very soul bare for her
observation. The thing has not been easy for me; indeed, I know of
nothing I could have done that would have been more difficult. Though
the present instance seems to give the statement the lie, I am not
easily confidential, my friend. I have had a definite object in doing as
I have done with Miss Baker. I am trying, as I never tried before in my
life, to get i