they'd go
East. Her father wouldn't refuse, though he'd feel bad p'r'aps; he never
refused her anythin'. If fifteen hundred dollars would be enough for
George alone, three thousand would do for both of them. Once admitted
as a lawyer, he would get a large practice: he was so clever and
hard-working. She was real glad that she'd be the means of giving him
the opportunity he wanted to win riches and position. But he must begin
in New York. She would help him on, and she'd see New York and all the
shops and elegant folk, and have silk dresses. They'd live in a hotel
and get richer and richer, and she'd drive about with--here she grew hot
again. The vision, however, was too entrancing to be shut out; she
saw herself distinctly driving in an open carriage, with a negro nurse
holding the baby all in laces in front, "jest too cute for anythin',"
and George beside her, and every one in Fifth Avenue starin'.

Sleep soon brought confusion into her picture of a happy future; but
when she awoke, the glad confidence of the previous night had given
place to self-reproach and fear. During the breakfast she scarcely
spoke or lifted her eyes. Her silent preoccupation was misunderstood by
Bancroft; he took it to mean that she didn't care what happened to him;
she was selfish, he decided. All the morning she went about the house in
a state of nervous restlessness, and at dinner-time her father noticed
her unusual pallor and low spirits. To the Elder, the meal-times were
generally a source of intense pleasure. He was never tired of feasting
his eyes upon his daughter when he could do so without attracting
attention, and he listened to her fluent obvious opinions on men and
things with a fulness of pride and joy which was difficult to divine
since his keenest feelings never stirred the impassibility of his
features. He had small power of expressing his thoughts, and even in
youth he had felt it impossible to render in words any deep emotion.
For more than forty years the fires of his nature had been "banked up."
Reticent and self-contained, he appeared to be hard and cold; yet his
personality was singularly impressive. About five feet ten in height, he
was lean and sinewy, with square shoulders and muscles of whipcord. His
face recalled the Indian type; the same prominent slightly beaked nose,
high cheek bones and large knot of jaw. But there the resemblance ended.
The eyes were steel-blue; the upper lip long; the mouth firm; short,
bristly