The doctor's advice was sane and sound enough, but Mr. Wedmore was not in the mood to listen to it. That notion of an entanglement with another woman rankled in his proud mind, and made him still less inclined to be patient and forbearing.
"I shall give Doreen warning of what I am going to do at once," said he, "before Horne turns up."
The doctor shrugged his shoulders. He was obstinate himself.
Mr. Wedmore crossed the long room to the door, and opened it sharply.
The hall was full of people and of great bales of goods, which were piled upon the center-table and heaped up all around it.
"Doreen!" he called, sharply.
Out of the crowd there rushed a girl—such a girl! One of those radiant creatures who explain the cult of womanhood; who make it difficult even for sober-minded, middle-aged men and matrons to realize that this is nothing but flesh and blood like themselves; one of those beautiful creatures who claim worship as a right and who repay it with kindness and brightness and sweetness and laughter.
No house was ever dull that held Doreen Wedmore.
She was a tall girl, brown-haired, brown-eyed, made to laugh and to live in the sunshine. Nobody could resist her, and nobody ever tried to.
She sprang across the hall to her father and whirled him back into the dining-room, and put her back against it.