"How time flies! But she is still very beautiful. Heaven grant my prayers may be answered. She deserves to be happy; and when I am gone she will be very lonely, and then feel keenly my harsh treatment," he murmured.
Wearily passed the hours until he heard her light step on the stairs. She came in. He thought there seemed a shadow on her face, but she came forward, and said, pleasantly:
"Well, father, you are likely to keep your daughter. I heard Ernest. I had not expected too much; he was grandly eloquent. He has altered in his looks; he seems much older, and is quite gray; mental work and hard study, he says."
"Then you saw him, and spoke to him! What do you mean by saying I shall keep you? Is he mar——"
"Yes," she replied, before he had finished his question. "He introduced me to his daughter, a little miss of about twelve; so you were right when you said that men were too sensible to suffer for or from love. He must have married in two years after he left us. Gerald left little Constance and me in the library, and went and brought him to see us. We were with him only a very short time, when he was sent for. He excused himself, and bade us good-day. Now, father, I will remove my wrappings, and order dinner."
Day after day passed on, and Constance had schooled herself to think of Ernest only as a happy husband and father. She did not blame him for taking a companion. He was away from all kindred and friends, and she had given him no hope to induce him to wait through all these years for her.
One day, just a week after their meeting at Congress, she was sitting reading to her father, when a servant entered, and handed a card. She read, Ernest Ellwood!
Paler for a few moments, and tightly pressed were the sweet lips. She did not rise from her seat, until she had communed with her heart. Now, she thought, I must call up all my fortitude and self-control, and prove to Ernest, to my father, and, more than all, to myself, that my heart is not troubled!
"Father," she said, "Ernest is below. He is waiting, probably, to inquire after you. I told him you had long been an invalid. Will you see him?"
"I would rather not, darling, unless you wish it. Go down a while, and if he must come up, let me know first."