"You shall have my jewels and my income when I die," growled her father, as he sat down again. "Any money he gives me, comes back to you. But if Rupert was to die----"
"Father!" Dorinda uttered a startled cry of pain.
"There! There!" snarled Mallien testily. "I don't mean that he is going to die, you silly girl. But he's mortal and _may_ die."
"God forbid! But if he did----" she hesitated, then uttered the word faintly, "--die?"
"Then I would have The Big House and the four thousand a year," said Mallien brutally. "You seem to forget that we are both descended from John Hendle, who died in the Waterloo year."
"I have never given a thought to it," said Dorinda uneasily, as she did not approve of her father starting this hare.
"Well, you ought to think of it. We descend from the elder son of John Hendle, and are the older branch."
"But Rupert descends through the male line, while we come through the female, father," protested the girl, puzzled by this genealogical conversation.
"Pooh! Pooh! There's no entail. Don't look so astonished, Dorinda; I don't mean to say that I have any claim, though, if everyone had their rights, we should be at The Big House and Rupert in his beastly cottage. There would be no need for you to marry him then."
Dorinda rose with great dignity. "I marry Rupert because I love him, and if he was a pauper, I should still love him."
"Oh, you could love him as much as you like," said her father, carelessly, "but if he were really a pauper, you shouldn't marry him. I'd see to that."
Dorinda walked round the table and bent over her father with a look on her face which made him push back his chair. "You would see to nothing," she said, very distinctly, and bringing her face close to that of Mallien. "It is my will and pleasure to marry Rupert, and nothing you can say or do will prevent my becoming his wife. You understand?"
"Who said anything otherwise," growled Mallien savagely, yet retreating dexterously. "As things stand, I am willing you should marry him. And, as you talk to me in that way, the sooner you become his wife and leave me alone the better it will be. Marry to-morrow if you like."
"I see," said Dorinda, whose face was perfectly colorless. "You want the extra five hundred a year to buy this blue sapphire you speak of."