"Is that true, Daphne?" asked her father.
Like a little white whirlwind Daphne jumped to her feet.
"Why, of course it's true, Old-Dad!" she stormed. "Live or die, sink or swim, I have given Mr. Kaire my solemnest word that I will marry him!"
"An absolutely—unconditional word?" probed Bretton.
"On one condition only!" triumphed Daphne. 201
"And that condition——" drawled her father.
"Is a matter of confidence between your daughter and me," interposed Kaire hastily.
"I respect the confidence," said Bretton. "But only a fool could fail to make half a guess of what that condition was. . . . You are keeping unconscionably sober."
"What I keep is my own business!" snapped Kaire.
"Per—haps," conceded Bretton. Quite casually, as one whom neither Time nor Circumstance particularly crowded, he picked up an ivory paper cutter from the table and studied it with some intentness before he spoke again.