“I’ll not have such a character in my family,” cried Clearwater desperately. He pushed his daughter away. “I can’t understand your wanting him. After all the money that’s been spent on your education, all the pains that’s been taken!” “I should think _you’d_ look on my education as a tearing success,” replied she. “It seems to have taught me to appreciate a man. But the education isn’t responsible for that. It’s because I’m _your_ daughter. How could I help despising the men who couldn’t do anything for themselves, who owe everything to others, who live like fleas on a dog, papa--instead of being strong and rising up and up? Like you, papa!” “Never!” exclaimed Clearwater. “I never was a demagogue, an inciter of class hatreds, a fermenter of envy--telling the shiftless and thoughtless----” She shook her finger laughingly. “Now, papa! Be careful! I’ve read some of your early speeches--when you were running for Congress and starting unions in the logging camps.” The red, so difficult to bring to old cheeks, so slow to spread, crept over his whole face. It is fortunate that his daughter did not know the whole of the why of that red--the deep-hidden story of treason to the people who had believed in him, of viler preceding treason to his honester self. “I was an ignorant fool in those days,” shuffled he. “And this fellow isn’t. He’s intelligent and cunning.” She was too wise to linger upon this dangerous ground of politics, once she had scored. Away she sped, with a delightfully crafty, “I do believe you think he’s after my money, father. I can see how you might think so. And you’re right to convince yourself. Yes, I understand. You’re putting him to the test. I’m glad of it.” “What do you mean?” inquired the puzzled father. She was laughing gayly. “Yes--I see it all. Go ahead, papa. Oppose all you like. Make him feel that you will cut me off if I marry him. I _know_ him. I know he doesn’t need that test. But I can’t blame you for not trusting him. You see, you don’t love him--yet.” Clearwater was dumfounded. To have his flank thus neatly turned! And that, just as he was about to deliver the final and decisive blow--the threat of cutting her off. He gathered himself together as best he could, whipped up his anger and said: “But I shall do that very thing.” She looked at him with sudden, touchingly sweet incredulity. “Oh, no--you couldn’t, papa. Not that I--not that we--want anything from you but your love. But you couldn’t make a base thing like money a test of the love between you and me.”