When Adam had finished his plum pudding he said, “I guess we never have had such a good Thanksgiving.”

Cal reached in his jacket pocket, took out the red-ribboned package, and pushed it over in front of his father.

“What’s this?” Adam asked.

“It’s a present.”

Adam was pleased. “Not even Christmas and we have presents. I wonder what it can be!”

“A handkerchief,” said Abra.

Adam slipped off the grubby bow and unfolded the tissue paper. He stared down at the money.

Abra said, “What is it?” and stood up to look. Aron leaned forward. Lee, in the doorway, tried to keep the look of worry from his face. He darted a glance at Cal and saw the light of joy and triumph in his eyes.

Very slowly Adam moved his fingers and fanned the gold certificates. His voice seemed to come from far away. “What is it? What—” He stopped.

Cal swallowed. “It’s—I made it—to give to you—to make up for losing the lettuce.”

Adam raised his head slowly. “You made it? How?”

“Mr. Hamilton—we made it—on beans.” He hurried on, “We bought futures at five cents and when the price jumped—It’s for you, fifteen thousand dollars. It’s for you.”

Adam touched the new bills so that their edges came together, folded the tissue over them and turned the ends up. He looked helplessly at Lee. Cal caught a feeling—a feeling of calamity, of destruction in the air, and a weight of sickness overwhelmed him. He heard his father say, “You’ll have to give it back.”

Almost as remotely his own voice said, “Give it back? Give it back to who?”

“To the people you got it from.”

“The British Purchasing Agency? They can’t take it back. They’re paying twelve and a half cents for beans all over the country.”

“Then give it to the farmers you robbed.”

“Robbed?” Cal cried. “Why, we paid them two cents a pound over the market. We didn’t rob them.” Cal felt suspended in space, and time seemed very slow.

His father took a long time to answer. There seemed to be long spaces between his words. “I send boys out,” he said. “I sign my name and they go out. And some will die and some will lie helpless without arms and legs. Not one will come back untorn. Son, do you think I could take a profit on that?”

“I did it for you,”. Cal said. “I wanted you to have the money to make up your loss.”

“I don’t want the money, Cal. And the lettuce—I don’t think I did that for a profit. It was a kind of game to see if I could get the lettuce there, and I lost. I don’t want the money.”

Cal looked straight ahead. He could feel the eyes of Lee and Aron and Abra crawling on his cheeks. He kept his eyes on his father’s lips.

“I like the idea of a present,” Adam went on. “I thank you for the thought—”

“I’ll put it away. I’ll keep it for you,” Cal broke in.

“No. I won’t want it ever. I would have been so happy if you could have given me—well, what your brother has—pride in the thing he’s doing, gladness in his progress. Money, even clean money, doesn’t stack up with that.” His eyes widened a little and he said, “Have I made you angry, son? Don’t be angry. If you want to give me a present—give me a good life. That would be something I could value.”

Cal felt that he was choking. His forehead streamed with perspiration and he tasted salt on his tongue. He stood up suddenly and his chair fell over. He ran from the room, holding his breath.

Adam called after him, “Don’t be angry, son.”

They let him alone. He sat in his room, his elbows on his desk. He thought he would cry but he did not. He tried to let weeping start but tears could not pass the hot iron in his head.

After a time his breathing steadied and he watched his brain go to work slyly, quietly. He fought the quiet hateful brain down and it slipped aside and went about its work. He fought it more weakly, for hate was seeping all through his body, poisoning every nerve. He could feel himself losing control.

Then there came a point where the control and the fear were gone and his brain cried out in an aching triumph. His hand went to a pencil and he drew tight little spirals one after another on his blotting pad. When Lee came in an hour later there were hundreds of spirals, and they had become smaller and smaller. He did not look up.

Lee closed the door gently. “I brought you some coffee,” he said.

“I don’t want it—yes, I do. Why, thank you, Lee. It’s kind of you to think of it.”

Lee said, “Stop it! Stop it, I tell you!”

“Stop what? What do you want me to stop?”

Lee said uneasily, “I told you once when you asked me that it was all in yourself. I told you you could control it—if you wanted.”

“Control what? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Lee said, “Can’t you hear me? Can’t I get through to you? Cal, don’t you know what I’m saying?”

“I hear you, Lee. What are you saying?”

“He couldn’t help it, Cal. That’s his nature. It was the only way he knew. He didn’t have any choice. But you have. Don’t you hear me? You have a choice.”

The spirals had become so small that the pencil lines ran together and the result was a shiny black dot.