I smiled gloomily. I saw that there was no need of comment upon the arrangement of the world. This girl young in her teens understood it as well as any one.
"Then I'd have to go, too," she uttered hoarsely with a dry sob of bitterness in her throat.
"Not necessarily," I interposed.
"Oh, yes, I should," she insisted doggedly, as though driving something painful into her flesh. "But it doesn't matter about me. But, Uncle Ranny, you won't—you can't give them up! They're all so happy here. Little Jimmie and Laura and Randolph! What chance would they have of growing up fine—away from you—-with a man like that? You won't let them go—you won't, you won't! Oh, it would be horrible, horrible!" she ended passionately.
"Listen, my dear," I tried to calm her. "I had no wish to harrow your feelings. I told you because you love the children—and we must face all this together. I shall want your help, your support." She flashed a sweet look mingled of pride and gratitude.
"After all you—have been through," she murmured incoherently. "But why don't you do this, Uncle Ranny!" and with the quick transition possible to youth, she was again alive, eager, excited, this little fellow conspirator of mine. "Why don't you let him come here and live right in this house for a while? We'll be awfully crowded," she ran on with flushed energy, "but we'll find room for him. And let's be awfully nice to him—and believe everything he says. Then we could watch him, and I just know we'll find out whether he's all right or not!"
I laughed at her enthusiasm.
"You forget, Alicia," I informed her, "that even if he shouldn't prove all right, he is still the father of those children."
"I don't care," she returned stoutly. "If he's bad and sees that we see he's bad, he wouldn't have the face to take them away from here. Even a bad father wants his children to be all right!"
"And how in the world do you know that, you astounding infant?"