He looked at her a little puzzled. She seemed very cool and composed, whereas he expected she would be angry and disturbed.
"We may as well come to business at once," he said. "If you wish to recover the charge of your ward, you must accede to my terms."
"State them."
"They are expressed in my letter to you. You must agree to pay me a thousand dollars each quarter."
"It strikes me you are exorbitant in your demands."
"I don't think so. At any rate, the money won't come out of you. It will come from my daughter's income."
"So you would rob your daughter, John Hartley?"
"Rob my daughter!" he exclaimed, angrily. "She will have enough left. Is she to live in luxury, and with thousands to spare, while I, her only living parent, wander penniless and homeless about the world."
"I might sympathize with you, if I did not know how you have misused the gifts of fortune, and embittered the existence of my poor sister. As it is, it only disgusts me."
"I don't want you sympathy, Harriet Vernon," he said, roughly. "I want four thousand dollars a year."