Lester was so horrified that for a moment he could not speak. He was horrified to see Stephen reduced so low. He was more horrified at the position in which he found himself, absolute arbiter over another human being, a being who had no recourse, no appeal from his decisions. It was indecent, he thought; it sinned against human dignity, both his and the child’s.... “As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master!” he cried to himself, shamed to the core by Stephen’s helpless dependence on his whim, a dependence of which Stephen was so tragically aware, all his stern bulwarks of anger and resistance broken down by the extremity of his fear--fear for what he loved! Fear for himself would never so have transfigured Stephen, never! Lester understood this. More, he felt it himself, felt himself ready to fight for Stephen as Stephen had been ready to fight for Teddy; he, Lester, who had never felt that he had the right to fight for anything of his own. His gaze on the child had passion in it as he said firmly, weightily, “I’ll never have anything done to your Teddy that you don’t want, Stephen. He’s yours. You’ve got the right to have the say-so about him.” Stephen looked at his father blindly, as if he did not understand these strange words. But though they were unfamiliar, though he could not understand them, they gave him hope. “You won’t have him washed?” he asked, clinging to the one point he understood. “Not washed or anything else if you don’t want it,” said his father, reiterating his own point. It seemed to him he could not live another day if he did not succeed in making Stephen understand that. To his astonishment, again to his shame, Stephen burst out with a phrase which had never before passed his lips except under protest, “Oh, thank you, Father! Oh, _thank_ you!” he cried loudly, his lips trembling. Lester found the child’s relief shocking. It made him sick to think what a dread must have preceded it, what a fathomless blackness of uncertainty in Stephen’s life it must represent. He spoke roughly, almost as he would to another man, “You don’t have to thank me, Stevie,” he said. “Great Scott, old boy, it’s none of _my_ business, what you do with your own Teddy, is it?” Even as he spoke--like a lurid side-glimpse--was it possible that there were people who would _enjoy_ thanks extorted on those infamous terms? Were they ever set over children? His insistence seemed to have penetrated a little way through Stephen’s life-long experience of the nature of things. The little boy stood looking at him, his face serious and receptive, as if a new idea were dawning on him. It was so new that he did not seem to know what to do with it, and in a moment turned away and sat down on the floor again. He reached for his Teddy and sat clasping him in his lap. The two were silent, father and son.