“What he is he in great part owes to you--and to him!”--pointing to the Jew. “You are an older man than he, with a wider knowledge of the world. You have used him as a tool with which to save yourselves. You found him in a ditch--in the same ditch in which you were yourselves. Instead of helping him out you dragged him farther in, pressing him down in the mire, so that, by dint of standing on his body, you might yourselves reach the bank, at the cost of his entire destruction. Though he is guilty, your guilt is a thousand times as great.” “There speaks the actress. Your sentiments, Miss Moore, do you credit; though, being of the stage, they’re stagey. They suppose that you can make a good man bad. I doubt it, be he old or young. All that you can do, is to bring to a head the badness which is in a bad one. Bernstein, your brother, and I, were born with a twist in us; a moral malformation; a trend in the grain which, as we got our growth, gave a natural inclination in a particular direction. I doubt if we could have gone straight if we had tried. You may take it for granted that we did not weary ourselves with vain efforts. I know that I did not. The things I liked had to be, like ginger, hot in the mouth; my pleasures had all to be well peppered. Your insipidities I never relished; nor was the fact that they happened to be virtuous a sufficient sauce. “As it happens, in this best of all possible worlds, spice costs money. And there’s the rub. For I had none--or as good as none. But I’d a brother who had. An all-seeing Providence and an indiscriminating parent, had caused him to be amply dowered with worldly goods. I made several efforts with my own hands and brains to supply myself with money. Sometimes they’d succeed; oftener they would fail. When they failed, in the most natural possible manner, I looked to my brother--my only brother--to make good the deficiency. To do this he now and then objected; which was odd. Until, one day, I came upon a man named Bernstein.” The Jew, who had been listening with parted lips and watchful, troubled eyes, to what the other had been saying, now went forward to him, cringingly. “Lawrence, good old friend, remember all I’ve done for you, and--and be careful what you say.” “I’ll remember, and so shall you; you never will be able to accuse me of forgetting. This man, Bernstein, was a Jew--an usurer.” “I lend money to gentlemen who are in need of it, that’s all; there’s no harm in it. If I didn’t some one else would.” “He negotiated loans on terms which varied--as I quickly learned. I had had some experience of usurers; but this was a new type.” “How new? Circumstances compel one to alter one’s terms--it’s only business.” “He lent me a little money on what he considered reasonable terms.” “And so they were--most reasonable. You know yourself they were.”