He panted like a man who had run a race with wolves and had just time to close the door before they caught him.
"May I tell Millie?" asked the girl. "She has worried about the house, fearing it would be sold."
He shook his head as if the subject was disagreeable.
"She will find it out," he said. "There is no need of haste. And at any rate I don't want you to give her any particulars. I don't want her to know how successful I have been. You can say that I have made money—enough to free the home. Don't tell any more than that to any one. It—it is not a public matter. I was so full of happiness that I had to tell you, but no one else is to know."
Daisy promised, though she asked almost immediately if the prohibition extended to Mr. Weil. He was such a friend of the family, she said, he would be very much gratified.
She had reached thus far in her innocent suggestion, when she happened to glance at her father's face. He was deathly pale. His body was limp and his chin sunken to his breast.
"Father!" she exclaimed. And then, seized with a nameless fear, was about to summon other help, when he opened his eyes slowly and touched her hand with his.
"You are ill! Shall I call the servants?" she asked, anxiously.
He intimated that she should not, and presently rallied enough to say he was better, and required nothing.
"What were we speaking of?" he asked, in a strained voice.