"Now, who is Fanny Green?" broke in Tom.
"Why, she is the little girl whose father killed his wife in a fit of intoxication, and then ran off leaving the child to the charity of strangers, and I think Little Wolf said, she was cruelly treated in the family where she is now living, and the family do not wish to be burdened with her.
"Well, well" said Tom, drawing a long breath, "I'm convinced Little Wolf will be a moping old maid, dressed in black, managing well her property, devising philanthropic plans for the benefit of paupers, she is getting too good for any man that lives."
"The best of it is, she does not even know she is doing a good thing," said Mrs. Tinknor smilingly.
Tom got up and walked impatiently to the window. Having accompanied his parents, with a view, to himself wipe away the few natural tears, that he imagined bedewed the rosy cheeks of Little Wolf, and pour into her willing ear a volume of cheering words, as he should ride by her side on their return trip, and, finally, to prevail upon her to reward his unequalled constancy, by becoming his wife, he was quite unprepared to meet the pale anguished face beneath the long black veil of which, for the first time, he caught a glimpse on the funeral day. Having witnessed the quiver that shook her delicate frame, as the grave received its dead, he lost all confidence in his pre-arranged means of consolation, and the words of his mother, not having been calculated to reassure him he was now thoroughly annoyed at the course things had taken.
But as Mrs. Tinknor well knew that Tom's feelings were evanescent, and seldom went beyond the surface, she immediately arose to go to Little Wolf, comforting herself with the reflection, that the storm she was leaving would be of short duration.
