"But I've no need to tell you that." "No, she is not bad looking," observed his wife with a slight sneer; "few girls would be in such elegant attire; but it surprises me to see that, with all her advantages and opportunities for improvement, she has not yet lost that baby expression she always had.

She'll never be half the woman Enna is." The days were past in which the lady mother had gloried in the fact that anywhere Enna would have been taken for the elder of the two; and now the contrast between her faded, fretful face and Elsie's fresh bloom was a sore trial to madam's love, and pride in her household pet.
But no one deemed it necessary to reply to the unpleasant remark.

Elsie only smiled up into her father's face as he came forward and stood at her side, and meeting his look of loving content and pride in her, just as she was, and calling to mind how fully satisfied with her was another, whose loving approbation was no less precious, turned away with a half-breathed sigh of heartfelt happiness, finished her greetings, and, the dinner-bell ringing at that moment, accepted Walter's offered arm to the dining-room.
Arthur was more and more charmed with his niece as he noted the modest ease and grace of her manners, both at the table, and afterwards in the drawing-room; listened to her music--greatly improved under the instructions of some of the first masters of Europe--and her conversation with his father and others, in which she almost unconsciously revealed rich stores of varied information gathered from books, the discourse of the wise and learned met in her travels, and her own keen yet kindly observations of men and things.

These, with the elegance of her diction, and the ready play of wit and fancy, made her a fascinating talker.
Contrary to Elsie's expectations, it was decided by the elders of the party that all should remain to tea.
As the others returned to the drawing-room on leaving the table, she stole out upon the moonlighted veranda.

Gazing wistfully down the avenue, was she thinking of one probably even then on his way to the Oaks--thinking of him and his disappointment at not finding her here?
"It's a nice night, this," remarked Arthur's voice at her side, "I say, Elsie, suppose we bury the hatchet, you and I." "I never had any enmity towards you, Arthur," she answered, still gazing straight before her.
"Well, it's odd if you hadn't; I gave you cause enough, as you did me by your niggardly refusal to lend me a small sum, on occasions when I was hard up.