“Do you call it dissipation to travel?” he asked, smiling at her eagerness. “I enjoy it almost more than anything else.”
“‘Almost more,’” Star repeated, quickly. “What would you enjoy more?”
“To see you perfectly happy,” he replied, tenderly; “and,” he added, “I believe that traveling does you fully as much good as anything else. We will go home and rest a week, then we will start for the far West. What do you say to my plan?”
Miss Meredith’s face lighted.
“Say ‘yes’ to it, by all means, Star,” she said, “and—I will go with you, if you will have me.”
“If we will have you,” Star returned, with dancing eyes. “Why, I think it would be the very nicest thing in all the world—we three, with Mrs. Blunt to look after us, do have such delightful, cozy times.”
“I have been wishing for just such an opportunity for a long time,” Grace said, “and if you will take me along with you, I should esteem it a great favor.”
“I think with Star, that it would be the best arrangement in the world; and, Miss Meredith, we shall consider you a member of our party,” Mr. Rosevelt said, with a bow and a smile to that young lady.
Star looked up into the old gentleman’s face.
“Uncle Jacob, how good you are to me!” she said; and her red lips trembled over the words, for she knew that he had planned all this expressly for her sake, to keep her thoughts pleasantly employed and from brooding over the past.