"I am sure I don't intend to fuss," she said, plaintively, "but how can I help worrying when I see you looking so badly, especially when you will insist on studying so hard?"
"Nonsense," said Mr. Carleton, looking up from his evening paper, with a frown. "I have looked over Elsie's lessons, and there is nothing wrong there. She isn't studying any harder than a healthy girl of her age should. What's the matter, Elsie—don't you feel quite up to the mark?"
He spoke kindly, but his tone was a trifle impatient, and before Elsie could reply, her mother began again.
"She won't tell you; she insists there is nothing the matter, but she has not looked like herself for days. If she isn't better to-morrow I shall have the doctor see her, and give her a tonic."
Mr. Carleton threw down his newspaper.
"My dear Julia," he said, "I believe you consider a tonic a cure for every evil in the world. The girls are ready, so let us go down to dinner, and see if Elsie doesn't make up for her loss of appetite at luncheon."
But Elsie did not make up for her lack of appetite at luncheon. She toyed with her food, and her color changed so often, from white to red, and back to white again, that by the time dinner was over even her father began to look at her curiously. But when Mrs. Carleton suggested that she should not go to Gertie Rossiter's, where the Club was to be held that evening, she protested that she was perfectly well, and was so decided in her determination to go, that, as usual, she had her way.
The meeting was at eight, and Marjorie and Elsie were obliged to hurry away from the dinner table to join the two Randolphs, as the four were to go together in the Carletons' carriage.
"Uncle George says we might have had his car as well as not," remarked Barbara, as they took their seats in the carriage. "He has come to spend the evening with Mother and Aunt Jessie, and won't need it."
"Your uncle is very generous with his car," said Marjorie, innocently. "He lent it to your mother and Aunt Jessie this afternoon, you know, and Aunt Jessie said they had a beautiful ride."