“Oh, no, father!” exclaimed Lola, catching his hand anxiously; “do go on, it’s very interesting.”
“Oh,” said the Doctor drily, “then we will proceed. ‘I love your daughter, and I want to ask you to let her become my wife.’”
“And to think,” said Lola, as he paused, “and to think that I didn’t know his handwriting.”
“So! So you know who had the impudence to write this,” assumed her father.
“Well,” replied Lola rather timidly, “I have my suspicions.”
“Oh, this love business,” groaned the Doctor in great disgust; “just as I have everything fixed, this must come! It is Mr. Fenway, I suppose?”
“Father!” cried Lola, indignantly. “Mr. Fenway! The idea!”
The Doctor turned the page quickly and read the signature, then exclaimed to her in wonder, “John Dorris! And I thought he only came here to talk to me! Did you know anything of this?”
“Anything?” replied Lola. “Well, I—I told him to write to you.”
For just a moment he hesitated; they were alone together in the world, these two, and the bond between them had been very close, and now all was to be changed; this stranger, a man, whom a few months before they had never seen, had stepped into their lives, and never again would this man’s child be to him quite what she had been for so many peaceful, happy years.