“In de parlor, Miss Wi’let.”

“Are the children in bed and asleep?”

“Yes, miss.”

Violet opened a bureau drawer and took therefrom several small packages.  Undoing one, she brought to light the miniature of her father which she had painted.  She carried it to the lamp and stood for some minutes gazing down upon the beloved face with fast-falling tears.

“Oh, papa, papa!” she murmured, “how hard it is to live without you!”

At length closing the case and restoring it to the box whence she had taken it, she gathered up the other parcels and went first to her mother’s dressing-room, where she laid the little box on the toilet-table, then on to the rooms occupied by her younger sister and brothers, leaving a gift for each.

Going back to her own rooms, she espied a letter directed to herself, which she had not noticed before.  She had seen Capt.  Raymond’s handwriting frequently during the weeks he had been at Ion, and recognized it at a glance.  The rich color rushed over face and neck, and her heart beat fast.

“Agnes,” she said to her maid, “you may go now; I shall not need you any more to-night,” and the girl went out, leaving her alone.

Even then she did not at once open her letter, but moved slowly back and forth for some minutes, with it in her hand.  Then kneeling down she asked earnestly for heavenly guidance in this important crisis of her life.

Looking into her own heart that day, she had learned that she was far from indifferent to him who had asked her to exchange with him vows of mutual love and trust, and to be the partner of his joys and sorrows.  She was not indifferent, but did she love him well enough to leave, for his sake, the dear home of her childhood and the sweet mother to whom her heart had ever clung with the most ardent affection?

CHAPTER XIV.

    “Nor less was she in heart affected,
     But that she masked it with modesty,
     For fear she should of lightness be detected.”
                    —­Spenser’s “Fairy Queen."

Violet had lingered at the Laurels, with her Aunt Rose, for some hours after her mother returned to Ion with the children, and in the meanwhile there had been a long talk between Mrs. Travilla and Capt.  Raymond, in which he had pleaded his cause with all the eloquence an ardent passion could inspire.

Elsie’s answer was, “If you have won my daughter’s heart, her hand shall not be refused you.  But she is yet too young for the grave responsibilities of married life.  Nor can I reconcile myself to the thought of parting with her so soon; therefore I should greatly prefer to have the matter dropped, at least for the present.”

The captain repeated what he had said to Mr. Dinsmore in regard to his willingness to leave Violet with her mother if only he might have her for his wife.