"You must be mistaken, my dear," said the old captain promptly. "She has her faults, but Catherine is never paltry, Hester. That cannot be."
"Either you are very much mistaken about her, or I am much mistaken about her," Hester said.
The old man looked at her with a smile on his face.
"I don't say anything against that. And which of us is most likely to be right?" he asked. "I knew her before you were born."
"Oh, before I was born! Does that tell you anything about her conduct to me? Once I was not, but now I am; and somebody quite distinct from other people."
"Very distinct!" Captain Morgan said.
"Then what does she mean by it?" cried Hester. "She cannot endure the sight of me. Oh, I know she is not paltry in one way. She does not care about money, as some people do; but she is in another. Why should she care about what I wear? Did you ever hear anything about my father?" the girl said, raising her eyes suddenly, and looking him full in the face. The old captain was so taken by surprise that he fell back a step and almost dropped her arm in his dismay.
"About your father!"
"About him and Catherine Vernon—and how it was he went away? He had as good a right to the bank as she had, had he not? I have not thought much about it; but I should like to know," said Hester with more composure, "how it was that she had it and not papa?"
"That was all before my time," said Captain Morgan, who had recovered himself in the interval. "I did not come here, you know, till after. And then it is not as if I had been a Vernon to understand all the circumstances. I was not of the family, you know."