His unsteady hand was fumbling with her hair, trying to quiet her--she had sunk to the floor now, and was gripping his knees, still pleading. "Have done, girl--have done!" he said, in weak repetition but she would not be quieted, though Mr. Cave was now fairly sweating with discomfort and surprise. Further protestation was spared him for the moment, for, on the tail of his last sentence, the door opened slowly and admitted the tall, stately figure of Mrs. Gentian to the curious scene. Mr. Cave froze at once, like a rabbit surprised by an owl, but Sparta rose from the floor with some dignity and confronted her mother. "You fool," said the latter, slowly. "You bawdy little fool." To Andrew, at his stricken post of observation, her voice was clear and thin as the voice of a corpse speaking from the dust, and he felt the sweat dry on his hands as he heard it. She turned to Mr. Cave. "Kennel, dog!" she said, tersely, and Mr. Cave, after one blustering, ineffective gesture, caught a glance from Sparta, and passed out of the room with his brow red and his eyes bent on the floor. Then Mrs. Gentian eyed her daughter. "You madam," she said, without rancor, "You madam in gauze. What do you mean by chambering here with that lackey when the gentleman you're to marry lies sick in his bed upstairs?" "Faith, madam," said Sparta, hardly, giving her gaze for gaze. "It must run in the blood, I think--for my father, too, has a liking for the servant's hall." Mrs. Gentian's hand went slowly to her breast, but her face betrayed no emotion. "You're indeed his very daughter to say that," she said, quietly, and now Sparta's eyes wavered and fell before hers. "But let it be so. I've heard you call the man you're to marry a fool." "Do you disagree, madam?" "Not I," said Mrs. Gentian, and laughed. "He's a puff of painted feathers--I'll buy his like for six-pence at a Punch-and-Judy. But, fool or no fool, he's rich, or his father is. Your father needs those riches--and no hot little miss like you is going to lecher him out of them. Do you understand, miss?" "I had not thought you so greatly attached to my father," said Sparta in a stabbing voice. "God knows I'm not," said her mother, tiredly. "But I'll not see him humbled." "And is it your proposal, madam, that I should--" "I propose this," said Mrs. Gentian. Her hand fell upon Sparta's shoulder and held it. "If this ninny you're to marry once knew what's passed between you and that lawyer's by-blow--he'd throw you aside like an applecore for all his ninnyishness. You must fasten him to you by his ninny's honor or lose him. You'll have him in your room, miss--as soon as he can walk--oh, I'll trust you for that--you have ways that would blind a sailor--but that you'll do. After that--" Her smile was an East wind. "Let him marry you or keep you--it matters little--we have him in a yoke."