“Yes, pa?”
“Come out here a little, will ye? I wanta have a little habla with ye.”
The girl stepped over the high threshold and stood in the dark beside her father.
“Set down,” he said, relighting his cigar.
She sat in a reed chair beside him.
“Daughter,” he began, “tell me what ye know ’bout Falcon the Flunky.”
“Oh! So Mr. Mangan——”
“Stop right here, Nita!”
She was silent a little. “Yes, I shouldn’t have started that,” she confessed. “Hunt’s all right. If he said anything at all, you forced it out of him.”
“I did—sorta agin’ my will, at that. But I hadta know. It wasn’t curiosity and pokin’ into another man’s affairs. It concerned you, and I had a right to know. Wasn’t much said. I chopped it off and waited for you to tell me. Go on.”