ing up, so far as any male belonging was concerned, leaving
V.V. in all other respects free? How could one do it?

The speculative calm of the sunken brown eyes deepened.

His thoughts went back to the white face of the private enquiry agent.
"Absolutely nothing, Sir." What had the fellow thought of hinting?
Nothing of that kind in V.V.'s composition, never fear. Yet it was a
curious anomaly that while one had a thousand ways of defending one's
daughter and one's property against that daughter's husband, there was
no power on earth by which a father could stretch his dead hand between
that daughter and the undue influence of a lover. Unless you tied her up
for good and all, lover or none....

One was left at the mercy of V.V.'s character....

"I ought to see more of her," he thought. "She gets away from me. Just
as her mother did." A man need not suspect his womenkind but he should
know what they are doing. It is duty, his protective duty to them. These
companions, these Seyffert women and so forth, were all very well in
their way; there wasn't much they kept from you if you got them cornered
and asked them intently. But a father's eye is better. He must go about
with the girl for a time, watch her with other men, give her chances
to talk business with him and see if she took them. "V.V., I'm going
to make a man of you," the phrase ran through his brain. The deep
instinctive jealousy of the primordial father was still strong in old
Grammont's blood. It would be pleasant to go about with her on his
right hand in Paris, HIS girl, straight and lovely, desirable and
unapproachable,--above that sort of nonsense, above all other masculine
subjugation.

"V.V., I'm going to make a man of you...."

His mind grew calmer. Whatever she wanted in Paris should be hers. He'd
just let her rip. They'd be like sweethearts together, he and his girl.

Old Grammont dozed off into dreamland.

Section 5

The imaginations of Mr. Gunter Lake, two days behind Mr. Grammont upon
the Atlantic, were of a gentler, more romantic character. In them V.V.
was no longer a daughter in the fierce focus of a father's jealousy, but
the goddess enshrined in a good man's heart. Indeed the figure that the
limelight of the reverie fell upon was not V.V. at all but Mr. Gunter
Lake himself, in his favourite role of the perfect lover.

An interminable speech unfolded itself. "I ask for nothing in return.
I've never worried you about that Caston business a