"Oh, Father!" she jeered. "Can't you take a joke?"
"I don't know as you ever offered me one before," growled her father a bit ungraciously.
"All the same," asserted little Eve Edgarton with sudden seriousness—"all the same, Father, he did stop breathing twice. And I worked and I worked and I worked over him!" Slowly her great eyes widened.
"And oh, Father, his skin!" she whispered simply.
"Hush!" snapped her father with a great gust of resentment that he took to be a gust of propriety. "Hush, I say! I tell you it isn't delicate for a—for a girl to talk about a man's skin!"
"Oh—but his skin was very delicate," mused little Eve Edgarton persistently. "There in the lantern light—"
"What lantern light?" demanded her father.
"And the moonlight," murmured little Eve Edgarton.
"What moonlight?" demanded her father. A trifle quizzically he stepped forward and peered into his daughter's face. "Personally, Eve," he said, "I don't care for the young man. And I certainly don't wish to hear anything about his skin. Not anything! Do you understand? I'm very glad you saved his life," he hastened to affirm. "It was very commendable of you, I'm sure, and some one, doubtless, will be very much relieved. But for me personally the incident is closed! Closed, I said. Do you understand?"
Bruskly he turned back toward his own room, and then swung around again suddenly in the doorway.