"Yes, a child," said the Senator, "but a woman; yes, Sir, as manly a woman as you ever saw--chase a fox or shake a 'possum out of a persimmon tree. Well, I must go down town and see what's going on. Don't sit up too long, Mr. Belford. Send for Washington and he'll pull you back into the other room." "Mrs. Estell, I was never more agreeably surprised," said I, when the Senator had taken his leave. "I expected to be tormented by an elocutionist." "If an elocutionist is your terror, you needn't be afraid of me," she replied. "I have read to father and my husband, and that is the extent of my--shall I say, inflictions." "Husband," I repeated. "Are you really married?" "Surely. Why not?" "You are so young--" "I am not old enough to be flattered by that remark," she broke in. "Yes, I have been married two years. My husband is the State Treasurer, and is at the capital now, but will be home next week. He stays over there a good deal of the time, and I go with him once in a while, but I don't like it there. I like my old home better." "I don't blame you for that. It must be a charming place. Have you any brothers or sisters?" "No, Sir. It was reserved for me to be the only and, therefore, the spoiled child. I don't remember my mother. There's her portrait." I looked at a picture that had struck me when first I glanced at the wall. How truthfully the Frenchman had caught a sweet and gentle spirit; how exquisite was the art that had vivified those loving eyes with the speaking light of life. "Charming," I said sincerely, and she did not look upon it as flattery, but accepted it as a truth. I looked at her and she did not avoid my eye, but met it, strong and full, with her own, and I felt that, though gentle, she was fearless. Sometimes the tone of her voice was serious and the expression of her face thoughtful, but her eyes appeared to have been always glad. "When are you going to begin reading to me?" I asked, after we had sat for a time in a contemplative silence. "I'm not going to read to you. Don't you see I haven't brought a book?" "Then play something," I requested, looking toward the piano. "I don't play; and now I must tell you, Mr. Belford, that I haven't a single accomplishment. I can't sing, and I never cared for dancing; I don't draw, wouldn't attempt to paint, and I can't speak a word of Italian. I was never intended for anything but a real companion for my father, and a dutiful wife to my husband. I am wholly unadorned." "No, you are adorned with the highest qualities. Any woman can learn to play a piano, to speak Italian and to make an attempt at painting, but every woman cannot be a perfect companion for a man." "And a dutiful wife to her husband," she said, laughing. "But to be dutiful is not so serious a matter.--not so serious to us as I fancy it is to you stage people." "Well, no," I admitted; "and also more serious than the views held by thousands of good people who live in the large cities."