Roger laughed heartily. “At it again!” cried he. “Really, you are very amusing.”
“Be that as it may,” snapped Richmond, “I want you to know that I will never take her back—never!—until I am sure she has given you up. You may stake your life on that, sir. When I put my hand to the plough I do not turn back.”
Roger leaned toward the unhappy man distracted by his own torturings of himself. “Will you believe me, sir,” said he earnestly, “when I say I am deeply sorry that I have been the innocent cause of a breach between you and your daughter. Perhaps it is just as well that she has gotten away from you. It may result in her developing into the really fine person God intended her to be. Still, I wish to do all I can to heal the breach.”
“That sounds like a man, Mr. Wade!” cried Richmond, all eagerness.
“I’ve been putting up with you this afternoon,” pursued Roger, apparently not much impressed by this certificate of his virtue, “because I hoped to do something toward ending the quarrel between you two.”
“You can end it,” interrupted Richmond. “You can end it at once.”
“Tell me how, and I’ll do it,” said Roger.
“She believes you wish to marry her.”
“I am confident she never told you anything like that.”
“She thinks you’re afraid to marry her unless she brought the money to keep her in the style she’s been used to.”