"You ask me to give my daughter to a dog that's trying to bite the hand that fed him?"
"Posy might do worse," said Tomlin hoarsely.
"Now you've torn it!" said Quinney viciously. "I'm alone against the lot of you. Good! I'll down the lot of you, I'll——"
Posy interrupted:
"Father!"
"Well, my girl?"
She spoke incisively, with something of his manner:
"You won't answer one important question. What is James threatening to do to you and Mr. Tomlin?"
Poor Quinney! He had only to speak with entire frankness to win his Susan back. But at what a cost! Could he roll in the dust of a humiliating confession? Unconsciously he clenched his fists, setting his firm jaw at an even more aggressive angle. In desperation he clutched at a straw. If he must be dragged down from his high estate as the honestest dealer in the world, let that iconoclastic deed be done by another hand.
"Look ye here, my girl, suppose you ask James that question."