EDWARD. [_thankfully able to meet anger with anger._] I find it impossible to believe that you couldn't somehow have put things right by now. MR. VOYSEY. Oh, do you? Somehow! EDWARD. In thirty years the whole system must either have come hopelessly to grief . . or during that time there must have been opportunities-- MR. VOYSEY. Well, if you're so sure, I hope that when I'm under ground, you may find them. EDWARD. I! MR. VOYSEY. And put everything right with a stroke of the pen, if it's so easy! EDWARD. I! MR. VOYSEY. You're my partner and my son, and you'll inherit the business. EDWARD. [_realizing at last that he has been led to the edge of this abyss._] Oh no, father. MR. VOYSEY. Why else have I had to tell you all this? EDWARD. [_very simply._] Father, I can't. I can't possibly. I don't think you've any right to ask me. MR. VOYSEY. Why not, pray? EDWARD. It's perpetuating the dishonesty. MR. VOYSEY _hardens at the unpleasant word_. MR. VOYSEY. You don't believe that I've told you the truth. EDWARD. I wish to believe it. MR. VOYSEY. It's no proof . . that I've earned these twenty or thirty people their incomes for the last--how many years? EDWARD. Whether what you have done and are doing is wrong or right . . I can't meddle in it. _For the moment_ MR. VOYSEY _looks a little dangerous_. MR. VOYSEY. Very well. Forget all I've said. Go back to your room. Get back to your own mean drudgery. My life's work--my splendid life's work--ruined! What does that matter? EDWARD. Whatever did you expect of me? MR. VOYSEY. [_making a feint at his papers._] Oh, nothing, nothing. [_Then he slams them down with great effect._] Here's a great edifice built up by years of labour and devotion and self sacrifice . . a great arch you may call it . . a bridge which is to carry our firm to safety with honour. [_This variation of Disraeli passes unnoticed._] My work! And now, as I near the end of my life, it still lacks the key-stone. Perhaps I am to die with my work just incomplete. Then is there nothing that a son might do? Do you think I shouldn't be proud of you, Edward . . that I shouldn't bless you from--wherever I may be, when you completed my life's work . . with perhaps just one kindly thought of your father? _In spite of this oratory, the situation is gradually impressing_ EDWARD. EDWARD. What will happen if I . . if I desert you? MR. VOYSEY. I'll protect you as best I can. EDWARD. I wasn't thinking of myself, sir. MR. VOYSEY. [_with great nonchalance_.] Well, I shan't mind the exposure, you know. It won't make me blush in my coffin . . and you're not so foolish I hope as to be thinking of the feelings of your brothers and sisters. Considering how simple it would have been for me to go to my grave in peace and quiet and let you discover the whole thing afterwards, the fact that I didn't, that I have taken some thought for the future of all of you might perhaps have convinced you that I . . ! But there . . consult your own safety.