The festivities had not
ended when we left."
"Buck Badger must never come home with you again!" he said, with a
firmness and suddenness that took all the color out of her cheeks, and
seemed to take all the breath out of her body. She sat still, as if
frozen by the statement, while a scared look filled her eyes. Then she
partly roused herself.
"What--why do you say that?"
"I have learned that he is not fit to associate with you--is not fit to
associate with any girl!"
"What have you heard, father?" she demanded, in a trembling voice. "I
know that whatever it is, it isn't true, for Buck is fit to associate
with any girl!"
She half-expected him to refer to the fracas of the evening before in
the campus.
"If there is one thing on which I am determined, it is that my daughter
shall never marry a drunkard!"
"Buck isn't a drunkard!"
"He was drunk when he was taken aboard the _Crested Foam_ by that
boatman, Barney Lynn."
"No, father!"
"You think not, of course. You think he was drugged."
"He was drugged. Lynn drugged him. He was not drunk, and he had not been
drinking. Who has been telling you such things? I am sure it cannot be
any one who has any honor."
"It was some one who felt it to be his duty to warn me of the fact that
my daughter is in danger of marrying a drunkard.
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