"I had a little talk with father this morning," she went on, and frowned—in advance.
"You poor thing!" he murmured, sympathetically, as though he were thinking of what she must have suffered.
As a matter of fact his mind was full of the conviction that she herself did not know which way she was going to jump and it behooved him to pick the right way.
"He asked me whether I loved you," she went on, sternly.
"Well, the answer to that was an easy syllable. When we go back you tell Mrs. Vandergilt that you have decided to allow me to serve under her. Don't worry; I'll be the boss. Ethel has played up like a trump—"
"I told him I didn't," she interrupted.
"You couldn't have told him that!" He smiled easily. "There was no occasion for it. Now tell me exactly what you did say to him."
He could see anger in her eyes—the kind of anger that is at least a first cousin to hatred.
"I said—"
"The exact words."