self for
not having noticed that the child had been growing thin and pale during
the last few weeks, and she recalled, now that it was too late, several
times when she had thought that Elsli looked over-heated and tired, but
she had done nothing about it, thinking it only a passing matter. She
sent at once for the physician. He gave little hope of the child's
recovery. He said she had evidently been "running down" for some time,
and she must have been eating too little and doing too much, and,
besides, he suspected some mental depression and anxiety. All this,
acting on a frame naturally delicate and weakened by the hardships of
her early years, had more than counteracted the gain that Elsli had
certainly made during the first months of her life at Rosemount.

Clarissa then told Mrs. Stanhope the story which the little girl had
related to her, and their tears fell fast over the simple tale of pity
and self-sacrifice. Mrs. Stanhope's heart smote her, as she learned how
Elsli had suffered from fear of her displeasure, and from the
concealment into which this had led her, a concealment so foreign to her
nature. She went to the child's bedside, and, embracing her more fondly
than she had ever done before, she said tenderly:--

"I can't tell you, darling child, how sorry I am that you should have
been afraid of me. I never meant it should be so, but I am naturally
reserved, and when my Nora died, I felt as if all my power of loving had
died with her. I liked you, and I meant to take good care of you, but I
see now that I have seemed cold to you, and haven't shown you the love
that has really been growing up for you in my heart. Forgive me, dear,
and believe that I do love you, and that I will be a real loving mother
to Fani, as I would be to you--" She stopped, overcome by her own
emotion.

Elsli's face beamed with a radiant smile. She lifted her feeble arm and
laid it around Mrs. Stanhope's neck.

"I am going to Nora," she whispered; "I will tell her how good you have
been to us. I love you," she added, and it went to Mrs. Stanhope's heart
that it was the first time the child had ever said these words to her.
She could not speak, but she drew Elsli's head to rest upon her
shoulder, and in a few moments the sick girl fell asleep with a peaceful
look upon her face, and Mrs. Stanhope sat holding her unwearied, till
Clarissa came and gently laid the little head back upon the pillows.

For several days Elsli continued in a