“Never mind me, young lady,” snapped her father, flying to the safe refuge of rage. “I’m going to save you from this blackmailing fortune hunter.” And the unpleasantly crowded teeth showed savagely through the ragged gray mustache. “I have asked him to marry me, and----” “What!” shouted Richmond, again forgetting the groom. “Are you _crazy_?” “I am,” said Beatrice simply. “I love him. I’m crazy--permanently crazy.” “Your mother will take you to New York this very day. You’ll sail day after to-morrow morning.” “I shall do nothing of the kind,” said the girl. The sound Richmond made was in the guise of laughter--of mockery. But no snarl or roar could have been so fraught with menace. “We’ll see about this, miss,” said he. “I’ll show you who is master in my family. I’ll show you you can’t go on degrading yourself with this low intrigue. That hound! So he thought he could fasten himself on me--did he? I’ll teach him!” “I have proposed to him. He has refused me. I’ve made love to him. He has repulsed me.” Richmond’s cruel mouth under his ragged mustache was horrible to see. “You shameless girl!” he cried. “It’ll be one of the servants next. I must get you safely married at once. If your mother wasn’t absolutely incompetent she’d have had you settled long ago.” “I shall marry no one but Roger Wade,” came from the quiet figure beside him in a quiet voice. “Have you got no sense at all? You say the puppy refused you. Don’t you know why?” “I know the reason you’d give.” “And that’s the real reason. He has heard about _me_! He’s got brains enough to understand that his best game is to----” “Don’t you say another word against him!” cried Beatrice, at the end of her forbearance. “You talk of my being a fool. What do you think of yourself? You don’t want me to marry this man. How do you go about preventing it? Why, you show me that you are not the father who, I thought, loved me, but that you couldn’t love anybody. You show me that you are not the kind of man I thought, but a snob, a hypocritical snob--yes, a hypocritical snob, who has been pulling wires behind mother--you all the time railing at her and at me and at Rhoda as snobs. And then, when you’ve shown me the truth about my surroundings, you go on to attack the man I love--to say about him things I know to be false. Is _that_ what you call clever?” “I’m glad you’re letting me see you in your true colors,” said the father, so exhausted by his passions that his voice came as little more than a hoarse whisper. “As for that--that fortune hunter who has been making a fool of you--don’t ever mention his name to me again!” “Do you want me to jump out of this cart?” cried the daughter, quivering with fury. Richmond pushed the horses into their swiftest trot. He did not speak again until he reined in at the entrance to the gray chateau. Then he said viciously, “Go to your rooms and get ready to leave for New York and Europe. You have two hours and a half.” IX FAMILY BEHIND-THE-SCENES