“Won’t you sit down?” asked Douglas.
“Well, yes,—I’ve got to talk to you girls like a Dutch uncle and I might just as well get down to it.”
“I have an engagement,” said Helen icily, consulting her tiny wrist watch, “so I will be excused.”
“What time is your engagement?”
“Whenever I choose to keep it.”
“Well, then I think you will choose to keep it a little later. I have one, too, but am going to spare a few minutes to talk about your father, and I think it best for all of you to be present.”
Douglas drew Helen down beside her. The girl was trembling just like a young horse who has felt the first spur. Robert Carter had always said that Helen was the best child in the world just so long as she had her own way. Fortunately her own way was not a very wrong way as a rule, but if there were a clash of wills, good-by to the will that was not hers.
Who was this bushy-eyebrowed young Caliban who came there ordering her about? She would show him! But in the meantime Douglas had an arm around her and Caliban was talking.
“Your father is a very ill man and as his physician I feel compelled to have a very serious conversation with the family.”