"This tiresome embroidery has been lying about so long that I am working on it for very shame," she replied.
"Elsie began it and was delighted with it for three days, but she has not touched it since."
"Very like the little fairy," he said, with a smile any reference to the young girl always brought to his lips.
Elizabeth did not wish to talk, it was important that she should hide the real feelings that oppressed her even under an appearance of playfulness. She looked up and smiled:
"If you were good-natured you would sit down here and read to me. There is Bulwer's new book."
"I will, with pleasure; but where is Elsie?"
"Oh, Tom Fuller came, and she made him take her out for a row; so I have been alone in my den, as she calls it."
"The child can't bear the least approach to a shadow," he said; "she must have her sunshine undisturbed."
He drew an easy chair near the window where Elizabeth sat, took up the novel she had asked him to read, and began the splendid story.
He read beautifully, and Elizabeth was glad to forget her unquiet reflections in the melody of his voice and the rare interest of the tale. Mellen himself was in a mood to be comfortable and at rest.