"I don't want to go down; I don't want any dessert," she whined.
Her hands were now hot and feverish, her teeth chattering with nervousness, and I recognized the approach of one of her sick headaches. I did not much wonder that she did not want to go down, so I coaxed her to let me undress her, and put her to bed, "and if you'll be a good child, you may sleep with me to-night."
"Very well," she said, laconically, with a weary sigh; and before the dinner-bell rang, I had laid her, quieted, in my bed, with, however, a very wide-awake and nervous stare about her eyes, but no tears and not much fretting.
For the next few days, the absorbing cares of the approaching party must have prevented my Aunt Edith from seeing the real indisposition of Esther. That her increasing irritability was the result of illness, I could not doubt, as I had ascertained for myself, that she could be as quiet as other children, when she was well. Josephine declared, I spoiled the teasing little object. Grace said, with a laugh:
"You can't reproach yourself with anything of the kind, can you, Joseph?"
And Phil, taking "the teasing little object" on his knee, said:
"Aunt Edith, upon my word, the child grows lighter every time I take her up. Is she well?"
"I mean to have the doctor this morning," she answered, looking up from her writing. "I am rather worried about her; she is a little feverish. Esther, don't stay by the window; it is too cold for you. Go up to the nursery, and tell Félicie to put a little sacque on you."
So Esther was remanded to the nursery, and it being the day before the party, there was plenty to be done and thought of for all hands. And though the doctor came, he did not seem much impressed with her state of health—left a very innocent prescription that was not sent for till the next day, and eased everybody's mind exceedingly. What a very comfortable thing it is to be able to pin one's faith to a medical coatsleeve, and according as it is elevated or depressed, be soothed or terrified.
Any disinterested observer, I think, would have agreed with Esther and me, that party-giving was not in any way conducive to home comfort. That wretched day, lessons of course were given up; the study being turned into a dressing-room, and the nursery sharing the same fate—my room was the sanctuary where Grace and Esther sought refuge from the bustle and confusion of the first and second floors, and no paradise it proved, Essie being unbearably peevish and Grace unbearably provoking. Aunt Edith tore herself away from the claims of upholsterer, florist, and waiter for a moment, to look in upon us—gave the final directions about our dresses, and pronounced Esther's sentence, which she had been dreading for days, to wit, that she must not go downstairs. It was a most proper sentence, but it was a cruel disappointment, and the child of course cried herself into another headache. I induced her to go to bed about seven o'clock, but she sat bolt upright, watching eagerly the operations of the hairdresser, who had come to Grace and me, before arranging Josephine's hair.