"Say! Are you a preacher?" mocked the Younger Man sarcastically.
"No more than any old man," conceded the Older Man with unruffled good-nature.
"Old man?" repeated Barton, skeptically. In honest if reluctant admiration for an instant, he sat appraising his companion's extraordinary litheness and agility. "Ha!" he laughed. "It would take a good deal older head than yours to discover what that Miss Edgarton's beauty is!"
"Or a good deal younger one, perhaps," suggested the Older Man judicially. "But—but speaking of Miss Edgarton—" he began all over again.
"Oh—drat Miss Edgarton!" snarled the Younger Man viciously. "You've got Miss Edgarton on the brain! Miss Edgarton this! Miss Edgarton that! Miss Edgarton! Who in blazes is Miss Edgarton, anyway?"
"Miss Edgarton? Miss Edgarton?" mused the Older Man thoughtfully. "Who is she? Miss Edgarton? Why—no one special—except—just my daughter."
Like a fly plunged all unwittingly upon a sheet of sticky paper the Younger Man's hands and feet seemed to shoot out suddenly in every direction.
"Good Heavens!" he gasped. "Your daughter?" he mumbled. "Your daughter?" Every other word or phrase in the English language seemed to be stricken suddenly from his lips. "Your—your—daughter?" he began all over again. "Why—I—I—didn't know your name was Edgarton!" he managed finally to articulate.
An expression of ineffable triumph, and of triumph only, flickered in the Older Man's face.
"Why, that's just what I've been saying," he reiterated amiably. "You don't know anything!"