"Oh, _come_ in, Laura!" cried her sister, as Laura appeared in the doorway. "Don't _stand_ there! Come in if you want to take part in a grand old family row!" With a furious and tear-stained face, she was confronting her father who stood before her in a resolute attitude and a profuse perspiration. "Shut the door!" shouted Cora violently, adding, as Laura obeyed, "Do you want that little Pest in here? Probably he's eavesdropping anyway. But what difference does it make? I don't care. Let him hear! Let anybody hear that wants to! They can hear how I'm tortured if they like. I didn't close my eyes last night, and now I'm being tortured. Papa!" She stamped her foot. "Are you going to take back that insult to me?" "`Insult'?" repeated her father, in angry astonishment. "Pshaw," said Laura, laughing soothingly and coming to her. "You know that's nonsense, Cora. Kind old papa couldn't do that if he tried. Dear, you know he never insulted anybody in his----" "Don't touch me!" screamed Cora, repulsing her. "Listen, if you've got to, but let me alone. He did too! He did! He _knows_ what he said!" "I do not!" "He does! He does!" cried Cora. "He said that I was--I was too much `interested' in Mr. Corliss." "Is that an `insult'?" the father demanded sharply. "It was the way he said it," Cora protested, sobbing. "He meant something he didn't _say_. He did! He did! He _meant_ to insult me!" "I did nothing of the kind," shouted the old man. "I don't know what you're talking about. I said I couldn't understand your getting so excited about the fellow's affairs and that you seemed to take a mighty sudden interest in him." "Well, what if I _do_?" she screamed. "Haven't I a right to be interested in what I choose? I've got to be interested in _something_, haven't I? _You_ don't make life very interesting, do you? Do you think it's interesting to spend the summer in this horrible old house with the paper falling off the walls and our rotten old furniture that I work my hands off trying to make look decent and can't, and every other girl I know at the seashore with motor-cars and motor-boats, or getting a trip abroad and buying her clothes in Paris? What do _you_ offer to interest me?" The unfortunate man hung his head. "I don't see what all that has to do with it----" She seemed to leap at him. "You _don't_? You _don't_?" "No, I don't. And I don't see why you're so crazy to please young Corliss about this business unless you're infatuated with him. I had an idea--and I was pleased with it, too, because Richard's a steady fellow--that you were just about engaged to Richard Lindley, and----"