"I thought you had met him," said Miss Tedder, opening her pale blue eyes to their widest extent. "Captain Bruce Kyles, who was such a great friend of papa's."
"Oh yes," Browne suddenly remembered, "that was the fellow who commanded a war-ship belonging to one of those tin-pot South American Republics.
"He is an officer in the Indiana Navy, replied Maud, much offended.
"So I believe," rejoined Browne, not at all disturbed. "That shabby little Republic down Patagonia way. They've got about five second and third-rate ships, I believe, and the Germans propose to wipe them out, or annex them."
"I don't know why you should talk of the Indiana Republic as 'them,' doctor. It's an 'it' and the Germans won't annex it. Bruce has come home to get more war-ships, and papa intended to do business with him."
"Did papa intend you should marry him?" asked Browne shrewdly.
Miss Tedder drew up her small person to its full height, which was not much.
"I don't know why you should be so familiar, doctor. Of course I look on you as a friend, as papa did. All the same, we are not such friends as to warrant you----"
"I see, I see," broke in the medical man impatiently. "I am less a friend than a doctor: yet I thought that your greeting was a warm one, and so perhaps have trespassed unduly. I beg your pardon. Sir Simon," he emphasised the title, "approved of your marrying this--this--Captain Kyles?
"Oh yes. He saw that I loved him, and Bruce comes of a very old Scotch family,--quite as good as our own"--the doctor suppressed a smile. "Bruce has rank in Indiana, and some day he might become the President of the Republic. Papa intended to announce our engagement shortly, but now he is dead and----" she began to sob again.