Drummond, or I cry off, and you can seek a husband to your daughter somewhere else,” said I. “It is I that am to be the only dealer and the only judge. I shall satisfy myself exactly; and none else shall anyways meddle– –you the least of all.” “Upon my word, sir!” he exclaimed, “and who are you to be the judge?” “The bridegroom, I believe,” said I. “This is to quibble,” he cried. “You turn your back upon the fact. The girl, my daughter, has no choice left to exercise. Her character is gone.” “And I ask your pardon,” said I, “but while this matter lies between her and you and me, that is not so.” “What security have I!” he cried. “Am I to let my daughter’s reputation depend upon a chance?” “You should have thought of all this long ago,” said I, “before you were so misguided as to lose her; and not afterwards when it is quite too late. I refuse to regard myself as any way accountable for your neglect, and I will be browbeat by no man living. My mind is quite made up, and come what may, I will not depart from it a hair’s breadth. You and me are to sit here in company till her return: upon which, without either word or look from you, she and I are to go forth again to hold our talk. If she can satisfy me that she is willing to this step, I will then make it; and if she cannot, I will not.” He leaped out of his chair like a man stung. “I can spy your manoeuvre,” he cried; “you would work upon her to refuse!” “Maybe ay, and maybe no,” said I. “That is the way it is to be, whatever.” “And if I refuse?” cries he. “Then, Mr. Drummond, it will have to come to the throat–cutting,” said I. What with the size of the man, his great length of arm in which he came near rivalling his father, and his reputed skill at weapons, I did not use this word without trepidation, to say nothing at all of the circumstance that he was Catriona’s father.