“You have helped a good man, a good old man, haven’t you, fairy?” he said, smoothing the hair that was as pretty as Dinah’s.
“Yes,” answered his wife, and Tessa shivered from head to foot. “People all said that you were a different man after you were married.”
“I’m going over to Norah’s,” cried Dinah. “I told her that I would come to write our French together. And, oh, father! I forgot to tell you, Gus will be in about eight.”
“I don’t know that I care for chess; I can not concentrate my attention as I could a year ago.”
“Why do you run off if he is coming?” asked Mrs. Wadsworth.
“He comes too often to be attended to,” Dine answered. “Won’t you be around, Tessa?”
“Perhaps.”
Tessa had resolved to give the evening to writing letters, and was passing through the dining-room with a china candlestick in her hand, when her father, reading Shakespeare at the round table, on which stood a shaded lamp, detained her by catching at her dress.
“Set your light down, daughter, and stay a moment.”
With her hand upon his shoulder, she looked down over the page he was reading: