“Nonsense!  I should exact a promise that their faith would not be interfered with.”

“But would that avail, since, ‘No faith with heretics,’ has been for centuries the motto of the ‘infallible, unchangeable,’ Church of Rome?”

“I think you are inclined to see danger where there is none,” returned the aunt.  “I would not for the world be as anxious and fussy about my children as you are about yours.  Besides, I think it quite right to let their father’s relatives do for them when they are both able and willing.”

“But Aunt Louise——­”

“There! don’t let us talk any more about the matter to-day, if you please,” interrupted Mrs. Conly, rising, “I must go now and prepare for my bath.  I’ll be in again this evening to see Enna and the others.  They’ll be down by the afternoon train.  Good-morning.”

And she sailed away, leaving Elsie sad and anxious for the future of her young cousins.

“What is it, daughter?” Mr. Dinsmore asked, coming in a moment later.  “I have seldom seen you look so disturbed.”

Her face brightened, as was its wont under her father’s greeting, but, this time, only momentarily.

“I am troubled, papa,” she said, making room for him on the sofa by her side.  “Here is a note from Enna.  The doctors give Molly no hope that she will ever walk again.  One cannot help feeling very sad for her, poor child! and besides something Aunt Louise has been telling me, makes me anxious for Isadore and Virginia.”

He was scarcely less concerned than she, when he heard what that was.  “I shall talk to Louise,” he said, “it would be the height of folly to expose her girls to such influences.  It is true I once had some thoughts of sending you to a convent school, under the false impression that the accomplishments were more thoroughly taught there than in the Protestant seminaries; but with the light I have since gained upon the subject, I know that it would have been a fearful mistake.”

“Dear papa,” she said, putting her hand into his and looking at him with loving eyes, “I am so thankful to you that you did not; so thankful that you taught me yourself.  The remembrance of the hours we spent together as teacher and pupil, has always been very sweet to me.”

“To me also,” he answered with a smile.

The expected guests arrived at the appointed time, Enna looking worn, faded and fretful, Dick sad and anxious, poor Molly, weary, exhausted, despairing; as if life had lost all brightness to her.

Her proud spirit rebelled against her helplessness, against the curious, even the pitying looks it attracted to her from strangers in the streets and public conveyances.

The transit from one vehicle to another was made in the strong arms of a stalwart negro whom they had brought with them from Roselands, Dick following closely to guard his sister from accident, and shield her as much as possible from observation, while Enna and Cal brought up the rear.