"He did that?" exclaimed Patsie, her heart in her throat; "he really did that?" Her eyes filled with tears and she turned away hastily with an emotion quite inexplicable to the older man. Bojo himself was much moved at the thought of how the father in the face of a supreme conflict had been willing to risk his reserves to provide for the future of his daughters.
Patsie came back, her emotion in a measure controlled. She placed her hand upon the shoulder of Mr. Swift, who continued to gaze at her without comprehension.
"I know you don't understand; you will later. Mr. Swift, I want you to sell every one of my securities, now, immediately. I want everything in cash."
Mr. Swift looked at her as though he had seen a ghost and then rapidly at Bojo. In his mind perhaps was working some fantastic idea of an elopement. Perhaps Patsie guessed something of this, for she blushed slightly and said:
"My father needs it. I want to give it to him."
Her words cleared the atmosphere, though they left Mr. Swift obstinately determined.
"But, Patsie," he said, as a father might to a child, "this is a bombshell. I can't allow you on my own responsibility to do a thing like this on impulse. You should not ask me. How do you know your father is in need? He has not sent you here?"
"No, no; never. Don't you know him better than that? If he knew he never would permit it. That's the difficulty, don't you see? He must never know of it and you must arrange some way so he will never guess it is coming from me."
Mr. Swift stared at her utterly amazed. At length he turned and, addressing Bojo, said:
"You are in the confidence of Miss Drake? If so, perhaps you can help me out. Does she know what she is doing, and is it possible that she has any valid reason for believing that her father can possibly be in need of such heroic assistance as this?"