“Yes, quite true,” fiddling with her bangles.
“And may I know why you have said no to a highly eligible young man, of a station far above your own, the son of a duke—a man young, agreeable, whose name has never appeared in any flagrant society scandal, who is well-principled and—and—good-looking—a suitor who has my warmest approval? Come now.” And he took off his glasses and rapped them on his thumb nail.
“I do not wish to marry,” she replied in a low voice.
“And you do wish to drive me out of my senses! What foolery, what tommy rot! Of course, you must marry some day—you are bound to as my heiress; and I look to you to do something decent, and to bring me in an equivalent return for my outlay.”
“And you wish me to marry Lord Anthony?” inquired his unhappy daughter, pale to the lips. Oh, if she could but muster up courage to confess the truth! But she dared not, with those fiery little eyes fixed upon her so fiercely. “Father, I cannot. I cannot, indeed!” she whispered, wringing her hands together in an agony.
“Why?” he demanded in a hoarse, dry voice.
“Would you barter me and your money for a title?” she cried, plucking up some spirit in her desperation, “as if I was not a living creature, and had no feeling. I have feeling. I have a heart; and it is useless for you to attempt to control it—it is out of your power!”
This unexpected speech took her parent aback. She spoke with such passionate vehemence that he scarcely recognized his gay, cool, smiling, and unemotional Madeline.
This imperious girl, with trembling hands, sharply knit brows, and low, agitated voice, was entirely another person. This was not Madeline, his everyday daughter. At last it dawned upon his mind that there was something behind it all, some curious hidden reason in the background, some secret cause for this astonishing behaviour! Suddenly griping her arm in a vice-like grasp, as an awful possibility stirred his inflammable spirit, he whispered through his teeth—
“Who is it?”