"Oh! yes, papa, very pleasant," she said, looking up at him with a face beaming with delight. He stooped and kissed her, saying, "I think I shall ride with you one of these days; should you like it?"
"Oh! so very, very much, papa," she answered, eagerly.
He smiled at her earnestness, and she hastened away to her room to change her dress and tell Chloe of her happiness.
Alas! it was but a transient gleam of sunshine that darted across her path, to be lost again almost instantly behind the gathering clouds.
More company came, so that the drawing-room was quite full in the evening; and, though Elsie was there, her father seemed too much occupied with the guests to give her even a glance. She sat alone and unnoticed in a corner, her eyes following him wherever he moved, and her ear strained to catch every tone of his voice; until Mr. Travilla, disengaging himself from a group of ladies and gentlemen on the opposite side of the room, came up to her, and taking her by the hand, led her to a pleasant-looking elderly lady, who sat at a centre-table examining some choice engravings which Mr. Dinsmore had brought with him from Europe.
"Mother," said Mr. Travilla, "This is my little friend Elsie."
"Ah!" said she, giving the little girl a kiss, "I am glad to see you, my dear."
Mr. Travilla set a chair for her close to his mother and then sat down on her other side, and taking up the engravings one after another, he explained them to her in a most entertaining manner, generally having some anecdote to tell in connection with each.
Elsie was so much amused and delighted with what he was saying that she at last quite forgot her father, and did not notice where he was.
Suddenly Mr. Travilla laid down the engraving he had in his hand, saying: "Come, Miss Elsie, I want my mother to hear you play and sing; will you not do me the favor to repeat that song I admired so much this morning?"