Suddenly Amabel burst into tears, and began to wriggle herself free from his arms. “Let me go,” she demanded; “let me go. I want Ellen.”
When Robert loosened his grasp she fled to Ellen, and was in her lap with a bound.
“I want my mamma—I want my mamma,” she moaned.
Ellen leaned her cheek against the poor little flaxen head. “There, there, darling,” she whispered, “don't. Mamma will come home as soon as she gets better.”
“How long will that be, Ellen?”
“Pretty soon, I hope, darling. Don't.”
Poor Eva Tenny had been in the asylum some four months, and the reports as to her condition were no more favorable. Ellen's voice, in spite of herself, had a hopeless tone, which the child was quick to detect.
“I want my mamma,” she repeated. “I want her, Ellen. It has been to-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow after that, and the to-morrows are yesterdays, and she hasn't come.”
“She will come some time, darling.”
Robert sat eying the two with intensest pity. “Do you like chocolates, Amabel?” he asked.