Maudie turned to Sylvia in desperation. “Sil,” she cried, “make them give it back. It’ll be the ruin of me. Why, it’s burglary! Oh, whatever shall I do?”
Maudie flung herself down on the bed and wept convulsively. Sylvia felt her heart beating fast, but she strung herself up to the encounter and faced Monkley.
“What’s the good of saying you haven’t got the jewelry,” she cried, “when you know you have? Give it to her or I’ll—I’ll go out into the middle of the road and shout at the top of my voice that there’s a snake in the house, and people will have to come in and look for it, because when they didn’t believe about the baboon in Mrs. Meares’s room the baboon was there all the time.”
She stopped and challenged Monkley with flashing eyes, head thrown back, and agitated breast.
“You oughtn’t to talk to a grown-up person like that, you know,” said her father.
Something unspeakably soft in his attitude infuriated Sylvia, and spinning round she flashed out at him:
“If you don’t make Monkley give back the things you stole I’ll tell everybody about you. I mean it. I’ll tell everybody.” She stamped her feet.
“That’s a daughter,” said Henry. “That’s the way they’re bringing them up nowadays—to turn round on their fathers.”
“A daughter?” Monkley echoed, with an odd look at his friend.
“I mean son,” said Henry, weakly. “Anyway, it’s all the same.”