“Then?” gulped the Billionaire, holding the back of his chair in a trembling grasp.

“Just this, father.  I’m going to Rochester, myself, to investigate this thing, to see this man, to hear his side of the story, to know—­”

“Do that,” cried Flint in a terrible voice, “and you never enter these doors again!  From the minute you leave Idle Hour on that fool’s errand, my daughter is dead to me, forever!”

Swept clean off his feet by rage, as well as by the deadly fear of what might happen if his daughter really were to learn the truth, he had lost his head completely.

With quiet attention, the girl regarded him, then smiled inscrutably.

“So it be,” she replied.  “Even though you disinherit me or turn me off with a penny, my mind is made up, and my duty’s clear.

“While things like these are going on in the world, outside, I have no right to linger and to idle here.  I am no child, now; I have been thinking of late, reading, learning.  Though I can’t see it all clearly, yet, I know that every bite we eat, means deprivation to some other people, somewhere.  This light and luxury mean poverty and darkness elsewhere.  This fruit, this wine, this very bread is ours because some obscure and unknown men have toiled and sweat and given them to us.  Even this cut glass on our table—­see!  What tragedies it could reveal, could it but speak!  What tales of coughing, consumptive glass-cutters, bending over wheels, their lungs cut to pieces by the myriad spicules of sharp glass, so that we, we of our class, may enjoy beauty of design and coloring!  And the silken gown I wear—­that too has cost—­”

“No more!  No more of this!” gurgled old Flint, now nearly in apoplexy.  “I deny you!  I repudiate you, Anarchist that you are!  Go!  Never come back—­never, never—!”

Stumbling blindly, he turned and staggered out of the room.  She watched him go, nor tried to steady his uncertain steps.  In the hallway, outside, she heard him ring for Slawson, heard the valet come, and both of them ascend the stairs.

“Father,” she whispered to herself, a look of great and pure spiritual beauty on her noble face, “father, this had to come.  Sooner or later, it was inevitable.  Whatever you have done, I forgive you, for you are my father, and have surely acted for what you think my interest.

“But none the less, the end is here and now.  Between you and me, a great gulf is fixed.  And from tonight I face the world, to battle with it, learn from it, and know the truth in every way.  Enough of this false, easy, unnatural life.  I cannot live it any longer; it would crush and stifle me!  Enough!  I must be free, I shall be free, to know, and dare, and do!”

That night, having had no further speech with old Flint, Kate left Idle Hour, taking just a few necessities in a suit-case, and a few dollars for her immediate needs.

Giving no explanation to maid, valet or anyone, she let herself out, walked through the great estate and down Englewood Avenue, to the station, where she caught a train for Jersey City.