“I hope Captain Keith will be one of our guests,” said Grace.  “I liked him very much when he visited us that time at the seashore.  Didn’t you, Lu?”

As the question was asked the captain turned a quick, inquiring look upon his eldest daughter, which, however, she did not seem to notice.

“Yes,” she said rather indifferently, “I liked him well enough; and I remember he was pleasant and kind at West Point—­showing us about and explaining things.  But even if he hadn’t been so kind and obliging I should be glad to entertain him as papa’s friend,” she added.  “Were you boys together, father?”

“No,” laughed the captain; “if I am not mistaken I am fully ten years older than Captain Keith.”

“Why, papa, I don’t think you look like it.  And you are such great friends,” exclaimed Lucilla.

“Well, my child, people may be great friends without being very near of an age,” laughed her father.  “For instance, are not you and I great friends?”

“Oh, we are lovers,” she answered with a bright smile up into his eyes.  “But then we are not of the same sex.”

“And that, you think, makes a difference, eh?” he laughed.  “But Max and Ned seem to love me nearly as well as my daughters do.”

“Every bit as much, papa!” exclaimed Ned earnestly.  “I do, I’m sure.”

“That is pleasant to hear, my boy,” his father said, smiling fondly upon the little fellow.  “And I presume brother Max would say the same if he were here.  Ah, we have reached home”; for at that moment the carriage turned in at the great gates.

“Our own sweet, lovely home!” said Grace, looking out upon the beautiful grounds with shining eyes.  “I am always glad to get back to it, no matter where I have been.”

“I too,” said Lucilla; “unless my father is somewhere else,” she added, giving him a most loving look.

“Ah, I wasn’t thinking of being in it without papa,” said Grace.  “I’d rather live in a hovel with him than in a palace without him.”

“I don’t doubt it, my darling,” he returned.  “I am entirely sure of the love of both of you, and of all my children.”

“And of your wife, I hope,” added Violet in a sprightly tone.

“Yes, indeed, my love, or I should not be the happy man I am,” he responded; then, as the carriage drew up before the entrance to the mansion, he threw open the door, alighted, and handed them out in turn.

“The children seem to be tired,” remarked Violet; “do you not think they might as well go at once to their beds, my dear?”

“Yes,” he said.  “Grace also; for she looks as weary as they.”

“Thank you, papa,” she said.  “I am tired enough to be glad to do so.  But don’t be anxious,” she added with a smile, as he gave her a troubled look; “I am not at all sick; it is only weariness.”  And she held up her face for a kiss, which he gave heartily and with a look of tenderest fatherly affection.