"I'll fix 'im so tight dat a gnat can't git in!" was the emphatic reply. "Dey shan't git nigh 'im ag'in!"
Julia was quiet as she and her father returned to the big house. Though her tongue was idle, her mind was busy. She was trying to elucidate this mystery of the attack on The Prince. Her father had said in as many words that he believed Devil Marston was at the bottom of it, but why should Devil Marston be so bitter against them? Half forgotten incidents came back to her—things which had been glozed over or dismissed with a laugh. Marston had been at their home several times, but all at once he stopped coming. She remembered it now. The last time he came was at night, and she had seen him only long enough to speak to him in the hall as she was starting upstairs. She recalled now some loud words being spoken by him; the regulated tones of her father in reply, and that night the Major had paced his room till nearly morning. When she asked for an explanation the following day, her father had put her off by saying it was purely a business matter which it was best she should not know about. She had let it go at that at the time, although she wondered that a business call should have been so stormy. Now she realized that something was being kept from her; that her father was shielding her through love and mercy from something she had a right to know. That had been in her girlhood, though only two years ago. But since then her mother had died, and during the following two years, which had brought her to twenty, she felt that she had grown to be a woman. She had met successfully the responsibility of caring for the house, and she felt that she could equally meet any other responsibility touching her family.
As they passed into the long hall again, the Major laid aside his hat and turned to the open library door to resume his reading. Julia gently detained him.
"Daddy, what's the trouble between Mr. Marston and us?"
The old man's face grew very grave.
"Who spoke of trouble, lassie?"
"Would a friend attempt so vile a thing as was attempted last night? He has grounds for his conduct, or thinks he has. I want to know it all. I'm sure you never harmed any of his, or him. Then why does the man hate us? He must be very wicked, for no honorable enemy would employ such underhand methods of attack. Now tell me all about it, won't you?"
Major Dudley tilted her chin with his bent forefinger, and gazed long and earnestly into the fearless eyes upheld to meet his own.
"There are some things little girls shouldn't know," he said, finally.
"Little girls, indeed!" she exclaimed, almost petulantly. "Won't you ever realize that I'm a woman, though a young one, and can't you trust your only daughter with a family secret, daddy dear?"