Her smile became a laugh, and then the blank look on his face became a very definite frown. “I don’t see the fun in such jokes, girl,” he said moodily, and he picked up the piece of cheese in his fingers and jerked it into his mouth. “I can’t for the life of me see how you--you, with the experience you have had, can make a jest of anything that has to do with marriage.” He pushed his chair back from the table and got upon his feet, brushing to the floor some crumbs that had clung to his knees. “I have told you the truth, father,” she said. “I have been acquainted with Jack Wingfield for some time. I liked him very much from the first, and I could see that he came suddenly to like me. I paid a visit to his mother--such a charming woman! I expected him to come to me some of these days. He came to-day--quite early in the morning, and--I gave him breakfast; but that was, of course, afterwards. That’s the whole story.” “Marriage--does he mean marriage--marriage? You are sure that he doesn’t mean to make a fool of you, girl?” he said in a low voice that had a good deal of meaning in it. “I have heard that he is a scamp--an empty-headed man who was expelled from college for bad conduct. Would his grandfather have tied up the estate, think you, if it hadn’t been that he knew the young fellow would make ducks and drakes of it? Does he mean marriage?” “What else does a man mean when he asks a girl to marry him?” “There’s such a thing as a left-handed marriage. I know these idle gentry. Game rights--some of them believe that the maidens on their estates are fair game. The rascals! Is that what’s in this youngster’s mind, do you think?” “He brought me to see his mother.” She spoke in a low voice, and rose from the table. “Why didn’t he come to me in the first place?” said her father. “What business had he making advances to you before he had got my consent--tell me that?” “I told him my story,” she replied. “Perhaps he gathered from it that, having once obeyed the commands of my parents, I should take care ever after to act on my own judgment. He talked to-day about seeing you; I told him that there was no need.” “Why should there be no need if he means to run straight? I would see that he meant right before I gave my consent. I don’t want you to be fooled by him or any other man even if he was a lord. You’re not in his station in life, and you know it. If he was making up to some one in his own station he would have to see her father first. What is there to laugh at?” She had become rosy, and had given a laugh when he made use of the old phrase; but she could scarcely explain to him that her laugh was due to her recalling the sequel to her introduction of the same phrase a few hours earlier. “I can’t tell you how funny--I mean how--how--no; all that I can tell you is that I have accepted Jack Wingfield and that I mean to marry him and be a good wife to him.”