In this perplexity, he ate with that ravenous haste which sometimes springs from an unconsciousness of what we are doing when under the pressure of great mental excitement. He was astonished when his spoon scraped on the bottom of that silver posset-cup. He sat for a moment embarrassed and uncertain how to begin. Where the feelings of his daughter were concerned, Jessup was a coward; to him she had been, from her very babyhood, a creature to worship and care for with a sort of tender reverence. So, with cowardice born of too much love, he thought to cheat himself, and bade her bring the little carpet-bag that had been his companion to London, and which he had dropped near the door.
Ruth, glad of anything that promised to distract her mind from its anxieties, brought the bag, and stood over her father while he unlocked it.
"See, child," he said, taking out a parcel done up in filmy paper, "I have brought some fill-falls from London, thinking my lass would be glad of them. Look, now!"
Here Jessup unrolled a ribbon, which streamed half across the room, as he shook out its scarlet waves.
"Isn't that something like, now?"
"Oh, it is beautiful!" cried the girl, with true feminine delight. "My dear, dear father!"
"I remembered—but no matter about that. My little Ruth is like a rose, and must have color like one. See what I have brought to go with the ribbon."
"White muslin," cried Ruth, in an ecstasy of delight. "Fine enough for the Lady Rose. How beautifully the scarlet sash will loop it up! Oh, father, who told you how well these things would go together?"
"I guessed it one day when the Lady Rose came here with a lot of stuff like that, puffed and looped with a ribbon bright as the field-poppies about her. You didn't know then, my lass, that your father felt like crying too, when he saw tears in his child's eyes, because she craved a fine dress and bonny colors for herself, and never thought to get it. There, now, you must get the best seamstress in the village to make it."
"No, no! I will make it with my own hands. Oh, father! father! how good, how kind you are!"