He fairly sobbed.

Then he felt a soft wind of feminine skirts caused by the sudden stoop of some one beside him, and Ellen's voice, shrill with alarm, rang in his ears.
"Father, what is the matter?
Father!" Such was the man's love for the girl that his first thought was for her alarm, and he pushed all his own troubles into the background with a lightning-like motion.

He raised himself hastily, and smiled at her with his pitiful, stiff face.

"It's nothing at all, Ellen, don't you worry," he said.
But that was not enough to satisfy her.

She caught hold of his arm and clung to it.