"Please, Ella, don't talk riddles."
"Well, papa and old Houghton have had a regular pitched battle; papa has been discharged, and is now a gentleman of leisure."
"Shameful! What earthly reason could that old wretch—"
"I'm the earthly reason."
"Ella, don't tantalize me."
"Well, that misguided little boy, who must stand six feet in his stockings, had the preposterous presumption—there's alliteration for you, but nothing else is equal to the case—to ask papa if he might pay his addresses to me. Isn't that the conventional phrase? At the bare thought both of our papas went off like heavy columbiads, and we poor little children have been blown into space."
"Oh, Ella I how can you speak so!" cried Mara indignantly. "The idea of associating your father with that man Houghton in your thoughts! It does indeed seem that no one can have anything to do with such Yankees as come to this city—"
"There now, Mara," said Ella a little irritably, "I haven't Aun' Sheba's grace of self-depreciation. I haven't been conjured into a monster by Northern associations, and I haven't lost my common-sense. I don't associate papa with old Houghton, as no one should know better than you. No daughter ever loved father more than I love papa. What's more, I've given him a proof of it, which few daughters are called upon to give. But I'm not a fool. The same faculties which enable me to know that you are Mara Wallingford reveal to me with equal clearness that papa and Mr. Houghton have acted in much the same way."
"Could you imagine for a moment that your father would permit the attentions of that young Houghton?"
"Certainly I could imagine it. If papa had come to me and said, 'Ella, I have learned beyond doubt that Mr. Houghton is sly, mean, unscrupulous, or dissipated,' I should have dropped him as I would a hot poker. Instead of all this the Vandal goes to papa like a gentleman, tells him the truth, intrusts him with the message of his regard for me, and promises that if papa will tell me he will not—also promises that he will not make the slightest effort to win my favor without papa's knowledge. Then he told his own father about his designs upon the little baker. Then both of our loving papas said in chorus of us silly children, 'We'll see 'em buried first.'"