I waited for them and asked them." "Then you had no business to do so.

You are an impertinent and interfering chit." "Is it impertinent and interfering to be anxious about one's mother's health, even if one is a chit ?" inquired Isobel, looking him straight in the eyes.
Then he broke out in his coarse way, saying things to his daughter of which he should have been ashamed.
She waited until he ceased, red-faced, and gasping, and replied: "Were it not for my mother, whom you abuse, although she is such an angel and has always been so kind to you, I would leave you, Father, and earn my own living, or go with my uncle Edgar to Mexico, where he is to be appointed Minister, as he and Aunt Margaret asked me to.

As it is I shall stop here, though if anything happens to Mother, because you will not send her abroad, I shall go if I have to run away.

Why won't you let her go ?" she added with a change of voice.

"You need not come; I could look after her.