"I don't scorn--" began Janice, but her father broke in there.

"Give it me, fellow!" ordered the squire. "No bond-servant
shall have my daughter's portrait."

An angry look came into the man's eyes as he faced his
master. "Come and take it, then," he challenged savagely,
moving a step forward,--an action which for some reason
impelled the squire to take a step backward.

"Oh, dadda, don't," cried Janice, anxiously. "Charles,
you would n't!"

Fownes turned to her, with the threat gone from his
face and attitude. "There's my devil's temper again, Miss
Janice," said he, in explanation and apology.

"Please go away," implored the girl, and the man went to
the door. As he turned to close it, Janice said, "'T was very
pretty, and--and--thank you, just the same."

The formalism of bygone generations was no doubt conducive
to respectful manners, but not to confidential relations,
and her parents knew so little of their daughter's nature as
never to dream that they had occasioned the first suggestion
of tenderness for the opposite sex the young girl's heart had
ever felt. And love's flame is superior to physical law in that,
the less ventilation it has, the more fiercely it burns.