"Why specially to-night?" she asked indifferently.
"Your father must go by the night train to Kecskemét," he said, with seeming irrelevance. "There is that business about the plums."
"The plums?" she asked, with a frown of puzzlement, "what plums?"
"The fruit he bought near Kecskemét. They start gathering at sunrise to-morrow. He must be there the first hour, else he'd get shamefully robbed. He must travel by night."
"I knew nothing about it," rejoined Klara, with an indifferent shrug of the shoulders. "Father never tells me when he is going to be away from home."
"No!" retorted Leopold, with a sneer, "he knows better than to give all your gallants such a brilliant opportunity."
"Don't be a fool, Leo!" she reiterated with a laugh.
"I don't give any of them an opportunity, either," resumed the young man, while a curious look of almost animal ferocity crept into his pale face. "Whenever your father has to be away from home during the night, I take up my position outside this house and watch over you until daylight comes and people begin to come and go."
"Very thoughtful of you, my good Leo," she rejoined dryly, "but you need not give yourself the trouble. I am well able to look after myself."
"If any man molested you," continued Leopold, speaking very calmly, "I would kill him."