“She’s dead,” was the reply.
“And is your pa dead, too?”
Ere Mildred could answer this a voice from the hall called out:
“Edith! Edith! where are you?”
“Here, pa, here with Minnie. Come and see her,” and bounding across the floor, the active child seized her father’s hand and pulled him into Mildred’s room.
“Excuse me, Miss Hawley,” he said. “Edith is very sociable; and I am afraid you find her troublesome.”
“Not in the least. I am fond of children,” returned Mildred, taking the little girl again upon her lap, while Mr. Howell sat down by the other window.
He was a very handsome man, and at first appearance seemed to be scarcely thirty. A closer observation, however, showed that he was several years older, for his rich brown hair was slightly tinged with gray, and there were the marks of time or sorrow about his eyes and forehead. In manner he was uncommonly prepossessing, and a few minutes sufficed to put Mildred entirely at her ease, with one who had evidently been accustomed to the society of high-bred, cultivated people.
“Edith tells me you come from England,” she said at last, by way of ascertaining whether he really were Richard Howell or not.
“Yes,” he replied, “I have lived in England for several years, though I am a native American and born in Boston. When six years old, however, my father removed to Mayfield, where he is living now.”