She walked out of the room, leaving him still in his chair, his head set square upon his shoulders and his lips tight shut. He allowed her to go without a word from him. The truth was that she had given him a surprise and a shock. Never once had she accused him during the year of having failed to do his duty as a father in protecting her from the possibility of such a calamity as had befallen her. Never once had she referred to his persistence in urging her to marry Marcus Blaydon; so that he had come to fancy, first, that she had forgotten this circumstance, and, later on, that he had been all too ready to condemn himself for the part he had taken in insisting on her marrying that man. Whatever slight qualms he may have felt during the days of the man’s trial, when the infernally sympathetic newspapers were referring to his daughter as a victim, and pointing their usual moral in the direction of the necessity there was for fathers to take a stricter view of their duties as the protectors of their daughters from the schemes of adventurers--whatever qualms he may have felt about this time at the thought that, but for his persistence and his daughter’s sense of duty, Priscilla might never have been subjected to such an ordeal, had long ago waned, and he had come to think of himself once again as a model father. The thought that his daughter was about to make what worldly people would call a brilliant match, quite without his assistance, was displeasing to him. Still, he might have got over his chagrin and given his consent; but that long speech of hers had taken his breath away. It had left him staring at the tablecloth and absolutely dumfounded. She had clearly been having a little savings bank of grievances during the year, and now she had flung the result of her thrift in his face. It was no wonder that he remained dumb. CHAPTER XX Was there any reason why they should wait for a year? That was the question which came up for discussion between them every time they met, which was usually once a day. It was, as a rule, at the hour of parting that the question came up for dispassionate consideration. And they discussed it quite dispassionately, he with his arms clasping her shoulders, and she enjoying an extremely close inspection of the sapphire in his tie, at intervals of pulling his moustache into fantastic twists, merging through this medium his identity into that of many distinguished personages, Imperial as well as Presidential, and even poetical. “A year! Great Gloriana! What rot! A whole year? But why--why?” “Why, indeed? But your mother--she takes the year for granted.” “And I suppose your father would turn you out of his house if you were to marry me inside that time?” “That would be almost certain. It is generally assumed that a year----” And here there would be an interval--a breathless interlude in the academic consideration of that nice question in the etiquette of wedlock.