The father’s eyes dwelt for a moment on her fair earnest face—so like her mother’s, so unlike a daughter of his—then they fell miserably.
“Worried?” said he. “Do I show it as plainly as all that? I flattered myself I kept it to myself.”
“Any one can see you are unhappy, father. Why?”
“I am in difficulties, my child, which you could not understand.”
“I could. Do tell me.”
“The fact is,” said the captain, taking up his pen and dotting the blotting-pad as he spoke, “that when on former occasions I have tried to claim your sympathy I—well, I was not quite successful. I do not want the pain of a similar failure again.”
“I would do anything, anything to help you, if I could!”
He took her hand and held it in his.
“I am in great straits,” said he. “An old Indian debt has followed me here. I cannot meet it, and ruin stares me in the face. You know I am a poor man; that I am living on other people—you have reminded me of that often enough; that of all the money which passes my hands, scarcely enough to live on belongs by right to me. You know all that?”
“Yes; I know that we are poor. How much do you owe?” she asked.