He was fumbling with his latch-key, when a hand was laid lightly on his shoulder. He had heard no sound of footsteps, and he turned with a low cry of terror. He turned and saw that it was his daughter who had touched him.
"Why, Jessie--Jessie, my darling! is that you?" he exclaimed.
"Yes, it is I," said the woman, bitterly. "What have you done with Max Van Duren?"
"Oh, never mind him just now. But why don't you kiss me, Jessie? Why don't you kiss the foolish old man that has never ceased to love you, and search for you, and long for you, day and night?" He was half laughing and half crying as he spoke.
She just put her lips to his cheek, but he was not satisfied till he had drawn her to him and she had kissed him again and again. Then she repeated her question: "Father, what have you done with Max Van Duren?"
"Oh, I've got the scoundrel in safe custody, never fear!"
"In safe custody! What do you mean?" she asked, anxiously.
"Come inside, and I'll tell you all about it."
He had succeeded in opening the door by this time, and his daughter followed him into the dark entrance-hall.
"You needn't be afraid of meeting anything worse than black-beetles," he said, with a chuckle. "Follow me, Jessie, and mind the stairs," he added, when he had bolted the front door. "There's fifteen of 'em; I've counted them many a time. We shall find a glimmer in the kitchen, I dare say."
They groped their way down, and entered the room.
"Many a worse crib than this," said Pringle, as he turned the gas full on.
Then he stirred the fire, and drew a chair up for his daughter and another for himself, and produced a bottle of brandy.
"And now for a comfortable little confab," he said, gleefully. "I've quite a lot to tell you, dear; and I dare say you have something to tell me."
"Suppose you tell me your news first," said the woman. Neither in her manner towards him, nor in her mode of addressing him, was there the slightest trace of tenderness, or any token by which a stranger would have guessed that the man before her was her father, whom she had not spoken to for several years. Her hard mouth and her watchful eyes never for a moment relaxed their hardness or their watchfulness.
"Funny, wasn't it," began Pringle, rubbing his lean, yellow hands in front of the fire, but with his eyes fixed on his daughter, "that I should have been Van Duren's clerk for three years before finding out who he was?"