"Yes, that's just it," hurried her father. "'Only' boys do things like that! Only first-love, the young, wild free-lance peddler ready and able any moment, God bless him, to dump down his whole tip-cartful of trinkets at the feet of the first lady-fair who meets his fancy! But a _grown man_, Daphne, is a corporation! No end of other people's investments tied up with him! No end of rules and obligations encompassing him about! Truly, little girl, there are mighty few grown men who could proffer honorable succor even to their belovedest on such short notice. Truly, little girl, taken all in all, I think your John is doing pretty well. [94] Maybe for all you know your John owes money!" "He does," nodded Daphne. "There were some queer old editions of something he persuaded the college to buy last year. They turned out not to be genuine or something and John feels he ought to refund on it." "And maybe there's an old father somewhere?" "It's an old mother," quivered Daphne. "And maybe the college president herself didn't make things any too easy for him!" "Miss Merriwayne's crazy about him," quickened Daphne. "All the girls say so! Everybody----" "U--m--m," mused her father. "Well, I think you'll hear from him again!" "Yes, I think I'll hear from him again," monotoned Daphne. Quite suddenly her teeth began to chatter and the eyes that lifted to his were like the eyes of a frightened fawn. "I feel so little," she whispered. "Even in this big coat I feel so little--and so cold! I never sat in anybody's lap," she stammered desperately, "and--and as long as you didn't like my--my mother I don't suppose you've [95] ever held anybody in yours. But perhaps--maybe----" With a little smothered cry her hands crept up to her father's shoulders. "Oh, if you just could hold me till breakfast time!" she begged, "or just till the coffee's ready." Flushing like an embarrassed school-boy her father caught her up in his arms and sank back into the narrow angular corner of plush and wood with the little unfamiliar form snuggled close on his breast. "Why--why, you don't weigh anything!" he faltered. "No, I'm not as fat as I was last week," conceded Daphne. Like a puppy dog settling down for a nap she stirred once or twice in her nest. "Do you think of any little song you could sing?" she asked. "Nothing except: 'Fifteen men on a dead man's chest-- Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!----'" began her father in a cheerful tenor. "No, I wouldn't care for that," sighed Daphne. [96] "Why, it's from Stevenson himself!" argued her father. "Never mind," snuggled Daphne. "Maybe I can think of one myself." Peering down a moment later through the bright tickly blur of her hair her father noticed suddenly that her lips were moving.