More than once Captain Patterdale had observed the pleasant relations between Don John and his fair daughter. As Nellie was a very pretty girl, intelligent, well educated, and agreeable, and in due time would be the heiress of a quarter or a half million, as the case might be, he was rather particular in regard to the friendships she contracted with the young gentlemen of the city. Possibly he did not approve the intimacy between them. But whatever opinions he may have entertained in regard to the equality of social relations between his daughter and the future partner of her joys and sorrows, we must do him the justice to say that he preferred honor and honesty to wealth and position in the gentleman whom Nellie might choose for her life companion. The suspicion, or rather the conviction, forced upon him by "the white cross of Denmark," that Donald was neither honest nor honorable, was vastly more painful than the fact that he was poor, and was the son of a mere ship carpenter.
Certainly Nellie did like the young man, though, as she was hardly more than a child, it might be a fancy that would pass away when she realized the difference between the daughter of a nabob and the son of a ship carpenter. While he was thinking of the subject, Nellie entered the library, as she generally did when her father was alone there. She was his only confidant in the house in the matter of the tin box, and he determined to talk with her about the painful discovery he had just made.
"Well, Nellie, did you have a good time to-day?" asked Captain Patterdale, as his daughter seated herself near his desk.
"I did; a capital time. Everybody seemed to enjoy it," replied she.
"But some seemed to enjoy it more than others," added the captain, with a smile.
"Now, father, you have something to say," said she, with a blush. "I wish you would say it right out, and not torment me for half an hour, trying to guess what it is."
"Of course, if I hadn't anything to say, I should hold my tongue," laughed her father.
"Do you think I enjoyed the occasion more than any one else, father?"
"I thought you were one of the few who enjoyed it most."
"What terrible sin have I committed now?"
"But you are going to tell me that I have sinned against the letter of the law of propriety, or something of that kind. This is the way you always begin."
