"I don't know how; but Elsie, you can teach me, can't you ?" "No, Flora, I cannot indeed, for papa says I must not play that game, because he does not like to have me sit down on the floor," replied Elsie.

"We must try to think of something else." "We needn't sit on the floor, need we?
Couldn't we play it on the table ?" asked Flora.
"I don't know; perhaps we could; but papa said I mustn't play it," replied Elsie, shaking her head doubtfully.
"But maybe he'd let you, if we don't sit on the floor," persisted the little girl.
Several other little ones joined their entreaties to Flora's, and at length Elsie said, "Well, I will go and ask papa; perhaps he may let me, if I tell him we are not going to sit on the floor." She went to his dressing-room, but he was not there.

Next she tried the library, and was more successful; he was in an easy chair by the fire, reading.
But now that she had found him, Elsie, remembering how often he had told her never to ask a second time to do what he had once forbidden, was more than half afraid to prefer her request, and very much inclined to go back without doing so.
But as she stood a moment irresolute, he looked up from his book, and seeing who it was, smiled and held out his hand.
She went to him then, and said timidly, "Papa, some of the little ones want me to play jack-stones, to teach them how; may I, if we don't sit on the floor ?" "Elsie," he replied, in a tone of great displeasure, "it was only the other day that I positively forbade you to play that game, and, after all that I have said to you about not asking a second time, it surprises me very much that you would dare to do it.

Go to my dressing-room, and shut yourself into the closet there." Elsie burst into tears, as she turned to obey, then, hesitatingly, asked, "May I go down first, papa, and tell the children that I can't come to play with them ?" "Elsie!" he exclaimed, in his sternest tone; and not daring to utter another word, trembling and weeping, she hastened from the room, and shut herself up as he had bidden her.
The closet was large, and there was a stool she could sit on; but when she had shut the door, it was both dark and cold.

It was a dismal place to be in, and poor Elsie wondered how long she would have to stay there.
It seemed a long, long time; so long that she began to think it must be night, and to fear that perhaps her papa had forgotten all about having sent her there, or that he considered her so very naughty as to deserve to stay there all night.
But at last she heard his step, and then he opened the door and called, "Elsie!" "Yes, papa, I am here," she replied in a trembling voice, full of tears.
"Come to me," he said; and then, as he took her hand, "Why, how cold you are, child," he exclaimed; "I am really sorry you have been so long in that dismal place.