Philip, flushed in the face and half expecting that the walls of the house would fall in upon him, paused—but there was no change at all in Mr. Trenchard’s attitude, unless possibly one shining hand was driven a little more deeply into the knee. There was perhaps some unexpected pathos in the intensity of those pressing fingers, or, perhaps, Philip’s desperate challenge was, already, forsaking him. At any rate he went on. “Why can’t you like me? I’m ready enough to like you. I’m not a bad kind of man, and I’ll be very good to Katherine, no one could ever be better to anyone than I’ll be to her. But why can’t we lead our own life? You’re an old man—you must have seen a lot in your time—you must know how times alter and one way of thinking gives way to another. You can’t keep a family together by just refusing to listen to anything or anybody. I know that you love Katherine, and if you love her really, surely you’ll want her to lead her own life. Your life’s nearly over—why should you spoil hers for her?” He paused again, but now he could not tell whether the eyes were closed or no. Was the old man sleeping? or was he fiercely indignant? or was he satirical and smiling? or was he suddenly going to cry aloud for Rocket? The uncertainty and the silence of the room worked terribly upon Philip’s nerves. He had begun courageously, but the sound of his voice in all that damp stillness was most unpleasant. Moreover, he was a poor kind of fellow, because he always, even in the heat of anger, thought a friend better than an enemy. He was too soft to carry things through. “He really does look very old,” he thought now, looking at the thin legs, the bones in the neck, the lines on the forehead of the poor gentleman, “and after all it can’t be pleasant to lose Katherine.” “If you’d only,” he went on in a milder voice, “give me a chance. Katherine’s much too fond of all of you to give you up simply because she’s married. She isn’t that sort at all. You knew that she’d marry some day. All the trouble has come because you don’t like me. But have you ever tried to? I’m the sort of man that you’ve got to like if you’re to see the best of me. I know that’s my fault, but everyone has to have allowances made for them.” Philip paused. There was a most deadly stillness in the room. Philip felt that even the calf-bound Thackeray and the calf-bound Waverley novels behind the glass screens in the large book-case near the door were listening with all their covers. Not a movement came from the old man. Philip felt as though he were addressing the whole house— He went on. “When you were young you wanted to go on with your generation just as we do now. You believed that there was a splendid time coming, and that none of the times that had ever been would be so fine as the new one. _You_ didn’t want to think the same as your grandfather and be tied to the same things. Can’t you remember? _Can’t_ you remember? Don’t you _see_ that it’s just the same for us?”