Now what was there to laugh at in so serious a question? Daniel was finding Miss Berkeley's conversation extremely upsetting.
"He died unsaved?" he asked gravely.
"I suppose a mediæval theologian would have said he did."
"I trust he didn't influence you, Miss Berkeley!"
"But of course, I got lots of ideas from him, for which I'm very thankful. If it had not been for his interesting mind, I could never have lived so long with his devilish disposition, or, as he used to call it, his 'hell of a temper.'" ("If he's going to fall in love with me," Margaret was saying to herself, as she saw his shocked countenance, "he's got to know the worst—I won't deceive him.")
"I'm addicted to only two vices, Mr. Leitzel: profanity and beer."
Daniel smiled faintly, she looked so childishly innocent. "You are different from any girl I ever met. As a conversationalist especially. New Munich girls never talk the way you do."
"You mean they are not profane?"
"You're only joking, aren't you?" asked Daniel anxiously. "I didn't refer merely to your using oaths, but the ideas you occasionally express; that, for instance, about 'respectability,' I'm sure I never heard our New Munich young ladies say things like that. However," he added, his face softening and beaming, "nothing you could do or say could ever counteract for me the impression you made upon me as you sat there to-night holding that baby!"
"You are very fond of children, aren't you, Mr. Leitzel?" she asked graciously.