He was seated behind the writing-table, in front of which a chair was set for his daughter.

She, unaccustomed from her childhood to submit to any constraint but that which the position of a guest, which she so often occupied, had trained her to impose on herself, was rather roused than awed by this magisterial arrangement.

She sat down with less than her usual grace of manner, and looked at him with her brows knitted.

It was one of the rare moments in which she reminded him of her mother.

An angry impulse to bid her not dare look so at him almost got the better of him.