When Carrington had gone to Cavenaugh, his heart in his throat, to speak to him relative to his daughter's hand, he unwittingly knocked off the top of a volcano.
"Marry my daughter?" Cavenaugh roared, emphasizing his wrath and disapproval with a bang of fist upon palm. "My daughter shall marry only among her equals, not among her inferiors. A king is not good enough for my Kate." There was another bang of the fist, decided and final. "A lawyer? Not if I know myself. I wouldn't trust a lawyer out of sight," bluntly. "Kate shall marry a duke or a prince, if I can find one suitable."
Carrington would have smiled had the moment been less serious.
"No man can possibly appreciate her worth more readily than I, sir," he replied, "or love her more dearly."
"Love?" with a snort. "Twaddle out of story-books!"
"I'm her father," Cavenaugh returned complacently, adding a gesture which had the effect of describing the fact that it was perfectly logical for a father to love his daughter, but that it wasn't logical at all for any other male biped to love her.
"I am sorry," said the disheartened suitor, rising. "I suppose that after this unpleasant interview ..."
"Oh, you're a decent sort," interrupted Cavenaugh generously; "and if you are of a mind to behave yourself hereafter, you will always find a chair at my table. But my daughter is not for you, sir, emphatically not. That is all, sir;" and Cavenaugh picked up his evening paper.
After such a rebuff, most young men would have given up; but Carrington never gave up till there was no possibility of winning. Immediately after the interview he went to the higher court with his appeal.
"Let us have patience," the girl whispered. "I'll undertake to bring him to reason."
But Carrington went home that night without his love for the father increasing any.
And so the matter stood at the present time. The affair had gone neither forward nor backward.
Ah, were he less honest, how easily he could bring the old curmudgeon to terms! There was that in his pocket which would open the way to the altar, quickly enough. But Carrington was manly and honest to the core, and to him blackmail stood among the basest of crimes. Many times during the past forty-eight hours the tempter had whispered in his ear that here was a way out of his difficulties; but the young man had listened unmoved.