Gertrude smiled. “Oh,” she observed, “I expect to have a great many 'society times,' as you call them, right here in Scarford. There seems to be no lack of them, and Mother is decidedly in the swim. It's no use, Daddy; my mind is made up. Don't you worry, it is all right.”
“Well—well, I—I must say—See here, are you really going to join that Chapter thing?”
“Yes.”
“You are! After all you said—”
“Yes, no matter what I may have said.”
“By—by time! I don't know what to do with you. I—I set a lot of store by you, Gertie. I kind of banked on you. And now—”
Gertrude's expression changed. She patted his cheek.
“Keep on banking on me, Daddy dear,” she whispered, “perhaps I'm not altogether hopeless, even yet.”
But her father, for once, refused to believe her.
“I don't like it,” he declared. “And other folks don't like it, either. Why, Barney Black got after me only the other day about you. He wanted to know why you—you, an engaged girl—was cruisin' around so much with this Cousin Percy of ours. He thought 'twas queer. I said—”