"Yes, indeed, and thank you a thousand times! if—"
"If what? father and mother give consent? There's no time to ask it, as I leave day after to-morrow; but I am sure it would not be withheld. So we'll do as we please first and ask permission afterward."
"Yes," Mildred responded, after a moment's musing, "I feel convinced that they would be very glad to have me accept your kind, generous offer; for it is such an opportunity as I am not likely to meet with again."
The remainder of the evening was devoted to the writing of a long, bright and cheery letter to her mother, telling of the pleasant prospect before her, and promising that the home circle should share in the enjoyments of her trip so far as descriptions of scenery and adventures, written in her best style, could enable them to do.
Mildred's letters had come to be considered a very great treat in that little community, their reception looked forward to with eager anticipation. The enjoyment would be doubled when they told of scenes new and fascinating, and of Cousin Horace's little girl, in whom they already felt so deep an interest.
Mildred had enjoyed her visit to Roselands but since the death of Miss Worth the atmosphere of the house had seemed somewhat lonely and depressing. So she was very glad of her uncle's invitation; which promised a change in every way delightful.
The journey was tedious and wearisome in those days, compared to what it would be now—staging across the country to the nearest point on the Mississippi, thence by steamboat to New Orleans, where they remained several weeks, Mr. Dinsmore being engaged in making necessary arrangements in regard to that portion of little Elsie's inheritance which lay in the Crescent City; then on to Viamede.
It pleased Mildred that this part of their trip was to be all the way by water, and after they entered Teche Bayou it seemed to her like a passage through fairy land, so bright were the skies, so balmy the breezes, so rich and varied was the scenery; swamps, forest, plain, gliding by in rapid succession, the eye roving over the richest vegetation; resting now upon some cool, shady dell gayly carpeted with flowers, now on a lawn covered with velvet-like grass of emerald green, and nobly shaded by magnificent oaks and magnolias, now catching sight of a lordly villa peeping through its groves of orange trees, and anon of a tall white sugar house, or a long row of cabins, the homes of the laborers.
It was a new region of country to Mr. Dinsmore as well as herself, and he remarked that he considered the sight of it a sufficient recompense of itself for the trouble and expense of the journey.
"But beside that," he added, "I have had the satisfaction of learning that the estate is even much larger than I supposed. That Scotchman was faithful to his trust; very shrewd, too, in making investments, and his death gives Horace control, during the child's minority, of a princely income."