Elsies Girlhood | Page 6

have to call her mamma? and do you think my own
mamma would like it?"
"If Miss Allison consents to take a mother's place to you, I am sure
your own mamma, if she could speak to you, would tell you she
deserved to have the title; and it would hurt us both very much if you
refused to give it. Indeed, my daughter, I cannot ask her to come to us
unless you will promise to do so, and to love and obey, her just as you
do me. Will you?"
"I will try to obey her, papa; and I shall love her very dearly, for I do
already; but I can not love anybody quite so well as I love you, my own
dear, dear father!" she said, throwing her arms around his neck.
He returned her caress, saying tenderly, "That is all I can ask, dearest; I
must reserve the first place in your heart for myself."
"Do you think she will come, papa?" she asked anxiously.
"I don't know, daughter; I have not asked her yet. But shall I tell her
that it will add to your happiness if she will be your mamma?"
"Yes, sir; and that I will call her mamma, and obey her and love her
dearly. Oh, papa, ask her very soon, won't you?"
"Perhaps; but don't set your heart too much on it, for she may not be

quite so willing to take such a troublesome charge as Miss Stevens
seems to be," he said, returning to his playful tone.
Elsie looked troubled and anxious.
"I hope she will, papa," she said; "I think she might be very glad to
come and live with you; and in such a beautiful home, too."
"Ah! but everyone does not appreciate my society as highly as you do,"
he replied, laughing and pinching her cheek; "and besides, you forget
about the troublesome little girl. I have heard ladies say they would not
marry a man who had a child."
"But Miss Rose loves me, papa; I am sure she does," she said, flushing,
and the tears starting to her eyes.
"Yes, darling, I know she does," he answered soothingly. "I am only
afraid she loves you better than she does me."
A large party of equestrians were setting out from the hotel that
evening soon after tea, and Elsie, in company with several other little
girls, went out upon the veranda to watch them mount and ride away.
She was absent but a few moments from the parlor, where she had left
her father, but when she returned to it he was not there. Miss Rose, too,
was gone, she found upon further search, and though she had not much
difficulty in conjecturing why she had thus, for the first time, been left
behind, she could not help feeling rather lonely and desolate.
She felt no disposition to renew the afternoon's conversation with
Annie Hart, so she went quietly upstairs to their private parlor and sat
down to amuse herself with a book until Chloe came in from eating her
supper. Then the little girl brought a stool, and seating herself in the old
posture with her head in her nurse's lap, she drew her mother's
miniature from her bosom, and fixing her eyes lovingly upon it, said, as
she had done hundreds of times before: "Now, mammy, please tell me
about my dear, dear mamma."
The soft eyes were full of tears; for with all her joy at the thought of

Rose, mingled a strange sad feeling that she was getting farther away
from that dear, precious, unknown mother, whose image had been,
since her earliest recollection, enshrined in her very heart of hearts.
CHAPTER II
O lady! there be many things That seem right fair above; But sure not
one among them all Is half so sweet as love;-- Let us not pay our vows
alone, But join two altars into one.
--O. W. HOLMES
Here still is the smile that no cloud can o'ercast, And the heart, and the
hand, all thy own to the last.
--MOORE.
Mr. Horace Dinsmore was quite remarkable for his conversational
powers, and Rose, who had always heretofore found him a most
entertaining companion, wondered greatly at his silence on this
particular evening. She waited in vain for him to start some topic of
conversation, but as he did not seem disposed to do so, she at length
made the attempt herself, and tried one subject after another. Finding,
however, that she was answered only in monosyllables, she too grew
silent and embarrassed, and heartily wished for the relief of Elsie's
presence.
She had proposed summoning the child to accompany them as usual,
but Mr. Dinsmore replied that she had already had sufficient exercise,
and he would prefer