“Poor Drummond!” replied the colonel, with a mournful shake of his head: “it is just as I thought. He has almost owned it, in fact. He is seriously smitten with one of those Challoner girls, and before long there will be a wedding in the place.”
“Now, father, this is just one of your whimsies,” replied Elizabeth, placidly. “Mr. Drummond is going to have his favorite sister, Grace, to live with him and keep his house. He told me so himself; and that does not look as though he expected to bring home a wife. So you may just put this idea out of your head.” But, though Elizabeth was well aware of the truth of her words, that no new mistress was to come to the vicarage, still her fine sympathy and unerring woman’s divination had read the meaning of the young vicar’s clouded brow, and she knew that he, too, had to try and be grateful for “the blessings that went over his head.”
Archie’s grand and somewhat heroic speech failed in its effect, as far as the colonel was concerned. Elizabeth was right in saying her father was longing to know the Challoners. The old man’s fancy had been mightily taken by the girls; but for Hammond, for his boy’s sake, he was capable of any amount of self-denial. Once he was sorely tempted to give in. When turning the corner of the Braidwood Road, not far from his own house, he came suddenly upon his daughter, who was standing on the side-path, talking to Dulce.
Dulce, who always seemed a sort of reflection and shadow of 283 her sisters, and who withdrew somewhat in the background, obscured a little by Nan’s beauty and Phillis’s sprightliness, was nevertheless in her way a most bewitching little maiden.
“There comes my father!” observed Elizabeth, tranquilly, never doubting that he would join them; and Dulce looked up a little shy and fluttered from under her broad-brimmed hat; for she had taken a fancy to the colonel, with his white moustache and kindly inquisitive eyes. He was a sort of hero in her fancy; and Dulce loved heroes,—especially when they wore a medal.
Colonel Middleton saw the little girl dimpling and blushing with pleasure, and his old heart thumped a little with excitement and the conflict of feeling: the innocent child-look appealed to his fatherly sympathies. There was a moment’s wavering; then he lifted his white hat, with a muttered “Good-morning,” and the next minute he was walking on with squared shoulders and tremendous energy.
Poor little Dulce’s lip quivered with disappointment: she thought it hard, when other people were so kind to them. Elizabeth said nothing; but she bade the child good-bye with greater tenderness than usual, and sent all sort of messages to her mother and Nan.
The colonel, meanwhile, had retreated into the house, and was opening his papers with more than his usual fuss.
“It is for Hammond,” he murmured to himself. “When one has boys, one must do one’s duty by them; but it was confoundedly hard, by Jove!” And all the remainder of the day a pair of appealing eyes seemed to reproach him with unkindness. But Elizabeth never said a word; it was not her place to find fault with her father.