as dead."

At this juncture came the timid summons upon the door, and the father
entered with a disturbed and subdued air. He did not conceal his hat,
but held it in his hands, and turned it round and round in an agitated
manner as he seated himself beside his daughter.

"Esmeraldy," he said, "don't you take it so hard; honey. Mother, she's
kinder outed, and she's not at herself rightly. Don't you never mind.
Mother she means well, but--but she's got a sorter curious way of
showin' it. She's got a high sperrit, an' we'd ought to 'low fur it, and
not take it so much to heart. Mis' Dimar here knows how high-sperrited
people is sometimes, I dessay,--an' mother she's got a powerful high
sperrit."

But the poor child only wept more hopelessly. It was not only the
cruelty of her mother which oppressed her, it was the wound she bore in
her heart.

Clelie's eyes filled with tears as she regarded her.

The father was also more broken in spirit than he wished it to appear.
His weather-beaten face assumed an expression of deep melancholy which
at last betrayed itself in an evidently inadvertent speech.

"I wish--I wish," he faltered. "Lord! I'd give a heap to see Wash now.
I'd give a heap to see him, Esmeraldy."

It was as if the words were the last straw. The girl turned toward him
and flung herself upon his breast with a passionate cry.

"Oh, father!" she sobbed, "we sha'n't never see him again--never--never!
nor the mountains, nor the people that cared for us. We've lost it all,
and we can't get it back,--and we haven't a soul that's near to us,--and
we're all alone,--you and me, father, and Wash--Wash, he thinks we don't
care."

I must confess to a momentary spasm of alarm, her grief was so wild and
overwhelming. One hand was flung about her father's neck, and the other
pressed itself against her side, as if her heart was breaking.

Clelie bent down and lifted her up, consoling her tenderly.

"Mademoiselle," she said, "do not despair. _Le Bon Dieu_ will surely
have pity."

The father drew forth the large linen handkerchief, and unfolding it
slowly, applied it to his eyes.

"Yes, Esmeraldy," he said; "don't let us give out,--at least don't you
give out. It doesn't matter fur me, Esmeraldy, because, you see, I must
hold on to mother, as I swore not to go back on; but you're young an'
likely, Esmeraldy, an' don't you give out yet, fur the Lord's sake."

But she did not cease weeping until she had wholly fatigued