Lidgerwood shook his head.

"You think you have made your case, but you haven't. What you say is
true enough; I wasn't afraid of drowning--didn't think much about it,
either way, I guess. But what I say is true, also. There are many kinds
of courage, and quite as many kinds of cowardice. I am a coward of men."

"Oh, no, you're not: you only think you are," protested the one who
thought he knew. But Lidgerwood would not let that stand.

"I know I am. Hear me through, and then judge for yourself. What I am
going to tell you I have never told to any living man; but it is your
right to hear it.... I have had the symptoms all my life, Stuart. You
have spoken of the schoolboy days: you may remember how you used to
fight my battles for me. You thought I took the bullying of the bigger
boys because I wasn't strong enough physically to hold up my end. That
wasn't it: it was fear, pure and simple. Are you listening?"

The man in the chair nodded and said, "Go on." He was of those to whom
fear, the fear of what other men might do to him, was as yet a thing
unlearned, and he was trying to attain the point of view of one to whom
it seemed very real.

"It followed me up to manhood, and after a time I found myself
constantly and consciously deferring to it. It was easy enough after the
habit was formed. Twentieth-century civilization is decently peaceable,
and it isn't especially difficult to dodge the personal collisions. I
have succeeded in dodging them, for the greater part, paying the price
in humiliation and self-abasement as I went along. God, Stuart, you