u leave this house at once or I shall call the servants."

Bud looked at young Langdon contemptuously.

"Yes, I think you would need some help," he sneered, feeling in his
veins the rush of red blood, the determination in his heart that had
a few years back carried him through eighty yards of struggling Yale
football players to a touchdown.

The Senator's son drew back his arm, but the confident look of the New
Yorker restrained him.

"Mr. Haines, in the South gentlemen do not make scenes of violence
before ladies."

The cold rebuke of Carolina cut into the silence.

Haines stood in perplexity. He did not know what to do or how to get
to the Senator. It was Hope who came to his rescue.

"I'll tell father you are here. I'll make him come, Mr. Haines. He
shall see you."

With the air of a defiant little princess she started for the door.

"Hope, I forbid you doing any such thing," exclaimed her older sister,
but the younger girl paid no attention. Randolph caught her arm.

"You shall not, Hope," he cried.

Hope Georgia struggled and pulled her arm free.

"I reckon I just got to do what seems right to me, Randolph," she
exclaimed. "I reckon I've grown up to-night, and I tell you--I tell
all of you"--she whirled and faced them--"there's something wrong
here, and father is going to see Mr. Haines to-night, and they are
going to settle it."

Norton alone was equal to the situation, temporarily at least.

"I'll be fair with you, Hope," he said reassuringly, and she stopped
in her flight to the hall door. "I'll take Carolina and Randolph in to
see the Senator, and we'll tell him Mr. Haines is here. Perhaps we had
better tell the Senator," Norton suggested, beckoning to Carolina and
her brother. "Let Mr. Haines wait here, and we will make the situation
clear to the Senator."

"You'd better make it very clear," exclaimed the younger girl, "for
I'm going to stay here with Mr. Haines until he has seen father."

The guilty trio, fearful of this new and unexplainable activity of
Hope Georgia, slowly departed in search of Senator Langdon to make a
last desperate attempt to prevent him from meeting this pestilential
secretary that was--and might be again.

When the door closed after them Hope came down to the table where Bud
Haines was standing.

"Won't you sit down, Mr. Haines?" she said. "I'll--I'll try to
entertain you until father comes," she said weakly, realizing that
again she was alone with the man she lo