"Why should I?"
"Don't you think they'd like to hear from you?"
"No."
"Why not?"
Conroy did not answer.
Don put down his pen, too nervous to hold it. "You know," he said, "Uncle John asked me to look after you here. He'd like to know how you're getting on."
"Write and tell him then," Conroy replied bitterly. "He ought to be glad to hear."
"What'll I tell him?"
"Tell him what you blame well please."
Don swallowed. "That you're drinking still?"
His voice went dry on the last word. The silence stood staring at him, holding its breath.
Conroy's head turned slowly, his jaws shut on his pipe. His eyes caught the glow from the lamp and glistened with two danger signals of light in his white face. "What do you mean by that?"
It was too late to draw back. Don arranged his sheets of note-paper with a hand that in some way reminded him of his father's. Then he said, in a tense steadiness: "He blamed me for not writing him, at college, about you. I promised him I'd write here. He let you come, on that condition—that I'd look after you, and let him know how you were getting on."
Conroy flamed up: "You mind your own business."
"That's my business."
"No, it isn't! It isn't yours and it isn't his! He threw me off—without a cent—to starve if I liked—down here. What do I care about him?"
"No, he didn't. He said he wanted to give you
