Connie fell back, deadly pale.
"No—no!" she said. "No—no! I am sartin sure 'tain't that way."
"Yus, but it be that way—I tell yer it be. You ax 'im yerself; there's no time for muddlin' and a-hidin' o' the truth. You ax the man hisself."
"Father!" said Connie. "Father!"
Harris, wrangling with another workman, was now seen approaching. When he perceived his daughter and Pickles, his first impulse was to dart away down a side-street; but Pickles, that most astute young detective, was too sharp for him.
"No," he said, rushing at the man and laying his hand on his shoulder. "Giles is bad, an' we can't find Sue no'ow, and yer must tell the truth."
Harris did not know why his heart thumped so heavily, and why a sort of wild terror came over him; but when Connie also joined Pickles, and raising her eyes to the rough man's face, said, "Be it true or be it lies, you are my own father and I'll niver turn agin yer," her words had a most startling effect.
Harris trembled from head to foot.
"S'y that agin, wench," he muttered.
"You're mine—I'll not turn agin yer," said Connie.