"Oh no, never, never!" Elsie sobbed, hiding her face for a moment on Aunt Chloe's shoulder. "I don't know how I ever dared to do it! I deserve to be punished very severely; no wonder papa is so displeased with me."
She was soon in bed, but did not, as usual with her, fall asleep at once; she lay for a good while listening to every sound, hoping even against hope that her father would relent and come to give her his forgiveness and a loving kiss ere she slept; but he did not, and at length she cried herself to sleep. It was the same thing over again in the morning; she hoped he would come to her to inquire of her penitence and good resolutions for the future, or send for her to go to him; but she waited and wished in vain, breakfasted in her own rooms—still too distrustful of her power of self-control to venture to join her parents in the breakfast-room—then prepared her task for the day; yet could not find courage to carry them to her father that he might hear her recitations.
She was glad the weather continued such as to keep visitors away; she hoped none would come till this trouble of hers was over; for how could she bear to have any one out of the family—even good, kind Mr. Travilla—know that she had so displeased her father? And while his displeasure lasted, how impossible it would be for any guest to fail to perceive it.
She tried one employment after an other—needlework, reading, music—but found no interest in any of them, and every now and then she would give way to a fit of violent weeping.
"Oh," she said to herself, "how long is it to last? Papa did not say, and I don't know when he will think I have been punished enough."
So the day wore wearily away, and night came again without any change for the better.
Sadly mourning over her estrangement from her father, and longing inexpressibly for his forgiveness and loving favor, a thought struck her.
"Ah, yes," she said half aloud, "I will write to papa the confession and plea for pardon he would not let me speak."
Opening her writing-desk, she selected a sheet of paper, took up her pen and dipped it in the ink; but, alas, how should she begin her note? By what title address the father who had forbidden her to call him that? How impossible to call him anything else! How disrespectful, how impertinent to omit a title altogether!