“In the name of God, amen.  May this indenture be damned.”

“Dorothy!” exclaimed Lady Crawford, horrified at her niece’s profanity.  “I feel shame for your impious words.”

“I don’t care what you feel, aunt,” retorted Dorothy, with a dangerous glint in her eyes.  “Feel as you wish, I meant what I said, and I will say it again if you would like to hear it.  I will say it to father when I see him.  Now, Aunt Dorothy, I love you and I love my father, but I give you fair warning there is trouble ahead for any one who crosses me in this matter.”

She certainly looked as if she spoke the truth.  Then she hummed a tune under her breath—­a dangerous signal in Dorothy at certain times.  Soon the humming turned to whistling.  Whistling in those olden days was looked upon as a species of crime in a girl.

Dorothy stood by the window for a short time and then taking up an embroidery frame, drew a chair nearer to the light and began to work at her embroidery.  In a moment or two she stopped whistling, and we could almost feel the silence in the room.  Madge, of course, only partly knew what had happened, and her face wore an expression of expectant, anxious inquiry.  Aunt Dorothy looked at me, and I looked at the fire.  The parchment burned slowly.  Lady Crawford, from a sense of duty to Sir George and perhaps from politic reasons, made two or three attempts to speak, and after five minutes of painful silence she brought herself to say:—­

“Dorothy, your father left the contract here for you to read.  He will be angry when he learns what you have done.  Such disobedience is sure to—­”

“Not another word from you,” screamed Dorothy, springing like a tigress from her chair.  “Not another word from you or I will—­I will scratch you.  I will kill some one.  Don’t speak to me.  Can’t you see that I am trying to calm myself for an interview with father?  An angry brain is full of blunders.  I want to make none.  I will settle this affair with father.  No one else, not even you, Aunt Dorothy, shall interfere.”  The girl turned to the window, stood beating a tattoo upon the glass for a moment or two, then went over to Lady Crawford and knelt by her side.  She put her arms about Aunt Dorothy’s neck, softly kissed her, and said:—­

“Forgive me, dear aunt; forgive me.  I am almost crazed with my troubles.  I love you dearly indeed, indeed I do.”

Madge gropingly went to Dorothy’s side and took her hand.  Dorothy kissed Madge’s hand and rose to her feet.

“Where is my father?” asked Dorothy, to whom a repentant feeling toward Lady Crawford had brought partial calmness.  “I will go to him immediately and will have this matter over.  We might as well understand each other at once.  Father seems very dull at understanding me.  But he shall know me better before long.”

Sir George may have respected the strength of his adversary, but Dorothy had no respect for the strength of her foe.  She was eager for the fray.  When she had a disagreeable thing to do, she always wanted to do it quickly.