He would have wanted to help.
But I couldn't - I couldn't go on - it would have meant making a mess of things all over again - I'm no good.
I haven't got the ability.
I'm not the man my father was.
I've always known it.
I've tried.
But it's no good.
I've been so miserable - God! you don't know how miserable I've been!
Trying to get out of the muddle, hoping I'd just get square, hoping the dear old man would never need hear about it.
And then it came - no more hope of avoiding the crash.
Clemency - my wife - she understood, she agreed with me.
We thought out this plan.
Say nothing to anyone.
Go away.
And then let the storm break.
I'd leave a letter for my father, telling him all about it - telling him how ashamed I was and begging him to forgive me.
He's been so good to me always - you don't know!
But it would be too late then for him to do anything.
That's what I wanted. Not to ask him - or even to seem to ask him for help.
Start again on my own somewhere.
Live simply and humbly.
Grow things.
Coffee - fruit.
Just have the bare necessities of life - hard on Clemency, but she swore she didn't mind.
She's wonderful - absolutely wonderful."
"I see." My father's voice was dry. "And what made you change your mind?"
"Change my mind?"'
"Yes.
What made you decide to go to your father and ask for financial help after all?"
Roger stared at him.
"But I didn't!"
"Come now, Mr Leonides."
"You've got it all wrong.
I didn't go to him. He sent for me.
He'd heard, somehow, in the City.
A rumour? I suppose.
But he always knew things.
Someone had told him.
He tackled me with it. Then, of course, I broke down... I told him everything.
I said it wasn't so much the money - it was the feeling I'd let him down after he'd trusted me." Roger swallowed convulsively. "The dear man," he said. "You can't imagine how he was to me.
No reproaches.
Just kindness.
I told him I didn't want help, that I preferred not to have it - that I'd rather go away as I had planned to do.
But he wouldn't listen.
He insisted on coming to the rescue - on putting Associated Catering on its legs again."
Taverner said sharply: "You are expecting us to believe that your father intended to come to your assistance financially?"
"Certainly he did.
He wrote to his brokers then and there, giving them instructions."
I suppose he saw the incredulity on the two men's faces and flushed.
"Look here," he said,