—Robert Morris.
“Elsie, don’t you want to spend that week at Ion? I think it would be just lovely! I’d a great deal rather go there for a long visit than to Roselands,” Annis said, taking off her hat and twirling it about in her hands, though her thoughts were evidently not on it.
They had just driven home from Ion and were in Elsie’s dressing-room, Aunt Chloe busy about the person of her nursling.
“Yes, I should like to go very much indeed!” was the quick, earnest rejoinder.
“Then coax your father to let us.”
Elsie shook her head. “That would be the surest way to make him say no. But you can go, Annis, if Cousin Mildred is willing, and I think it likely she will be; don’t you?”
“As if I’d care the least bit to go without you!” Annis exclaimed half indignantly. “But are you never allowed to coax?”
“No, not at all when papa is the person. He generally says yes or no at once, and then that’s the end of it. Sometimes he says, ‘I will consider the matter,’ or ‘I am not ready to decide that question yet,’ and then I must just wait patiently till his answer is ready. I think mamma and Mr. Travilla can sometimes persuade him when they try, and I do hope they will try. You know,” she added with a merry look, “he wouldn’t be so rude to them as to refuse to listen to anything they might want to say.”
“No; and I think he might be as polite to you.”
“Papa always is polite to me, I think,” Elsie answered gravely. “But you know it’s his duty to train me up right, so he has to make rules and see that I obey them.”