Kate looked at him and put out her hand. “You never did—I won't believe a word of it.”
“Ask your father, my dear. He helped carry me upstairs, and Ben pulled off my boots. Oh, it was most disgraceful! I'm just beginning to live it down,” and he reached over and patted the girl's cheek, his hearty laugh ringing through the room.
Kate was smiling now—her Uncle George was always irresistible when he was like this.
“But Harry isn't you,” she pouted.
“ISN'T ME!—why I was ten times worse! He's only twenty-one and I was twenty-five. He's got four years the better of me in which to reform.”
“He'll NEVER be like you—you never broke a promise in your life. He gave me his word of honor he would never get—yes—I'm just going to say it—drunk—again: yes—that's the very word—DRUNK! I don't care—I won't have it! I won't have anything to do with anybody who breaks his promise, and who can't keep sober. My father was never so in his life, and Harry shall never come near me again if he—”
“Hold on!—HOLD ON! Oh, what an unforgiving minx! You Seymours are all like tinder boxes—your mother was just like you and so was—”
“Well, not father,” she bridled, with a toss of her head.
St. George smiled queerly—Prim was one of his jokes. “Your father, my dear Kate, has the milk of human kindness in his veins, not red fighting blood. That makes a whole lot of difference. Now listen to me:—you love Harry—”
“No! I DESPISE him! I told him so!” She had risen from her seat and had moved to the mantel, where she stood looking into the fire, her back toward him.