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reassuring, but his eyes were still anxious.
    "A symbol," Jester said. He repeated the word because it was the first time he had spoken it in conversation, although it was one of his favorite words in school compositions. "A symbol of this summertime. I used to have ideas exactly like everybody else. And now I have my own ideas."
    "Such as?"
    Jester did not answer for a moment. And when he spoke his voice broke with tension and adolescence. "For one thing, I question the justice of white supremacy."
    The challenge was plain as a loaded pistol flung across the table. But the Judge could not accept it; his throat was dry and aching and he swallowed feebly.
    "I know it's a shock to you, Grandfather. But I had to tell you, otherwise you would have taken it for granite I was like I used to be."
    "Take it for granted," the Judge corrected. "Not
granite.
What kind of wild-eyed radicals have you been consorting with?"
    "Nobody. This summer I've been very—" Jester was going to say
I've been very lonely,
but he could not bring himself to admit this truth aloud.
    "Well, all I say is, this talk about mixed races and pink mules in the picture are certainly—abnormal."
    The word struck Jester like a blow in the groin and he flushed violently. The pain made him strike back: "All my life I have loved you—I even worshiped you, Grandfather. I thought you were the wisest, kindest man on earth. I listened to everything you said like gospel truth. I saved everything in print about you. My scrapbook on you was started as soon as I began to read. I always thought you ought to be—President."
    The Judge ignored the past tense and there was the warmth of self-pride in his veins. A mirrorlike projection reflected his own feelings for his grandson—the fair, unfolding child of his fair doomed son. Love and memory left his heart open and unaware.
    "That time I heard about when that Negro from Cuba was making a talk in the House I was so proud of you. When the other congressmen stood up you sat back farther in your chair, propped your feet up and lighted a cigar. I thought it was wonderful. I was so proud of you. But now I see it differently. It was rude and bad manners. I am ashamed for you when I remember it. When I think back how I used to worship you—"
    Jester could not finish, for the distress of the old Judge was obvious. His crippled arm tightened and his hand curled hard and spastic while the elbow joint crooked uncontrollably. The shock of Jester's words interacted with his disorder so that tears of emotional and physical hurt started. He blew his nose and said after some moments of silence: "Far sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child."
    But Jester resented the fact that his grandfather was so vulnerable. "But Grandfather, you've talked all you want to always. And I have listened and believed. But now that I have a few opinions of my own, you won't stand for it and start quoting the Bible. That isn't fair because it automatically puts a person in the wrong."
    "It's not the Bible—Shakespeare."
    "Anyway I'm not your child. I'm your grandson and my father's child."
    The fan turned in the breathless afternoon and the sun shone on the dining table with the platter of carved chicken and the butter melted in the butter dish. Jester held the cool tea glass to his cheek and fondled it before he spoke.
    "Sometimes I wonder if I'm not beginning to suspect why my father—did what he did."
    The dead still lived in the ornate, Victorian house with the cumbersome furniture. The dressing room of the Judge's wife was still kept as it was in her lifetime with her silver appointments on the bureau and the closet with her clothes untouched except for occasional dusting. And Jester grew up with his father's photographs, and in the library there was the framed certificate of admittance to the bar. But though all through the house there were reminders of the lives of the dead, the actual circumstance of death was never mentioned,