"I thought she might be suffering from toothache or neuralgia, wearing that scarf about her face on such a warm day--particularly as she frowned and screwed her mouth in a rather distressed way," he explained. Elsie smiled. Indeed she almost laughed, partly because she was herself struck by the humor of it, partly because it would so amuse Elsie Moss when she wrote her about it. "Oh, no," she repeated. "Oh, no, Uncle John"--resolutely--"she was just--well--she was acting, I suppose. She wants very much to go on the stage." "And doesn't lose any opportunity for practice?" He smiled, but rather ruefully. "Poor child! Somehow, of all ambitions, there seems to be more tragedy, more pitifulness, underlying that than any other. Where one succeeds, so many fail--go down into darkness and obscurity. Your mother had the fever at one time as a very young girl, Elsie. As a matter of fact, she had some little talent in that direction, but fortunately we were able to persuade her to give up the idea entirely." He sighed. "She was so tender-hearted and affectionate that she could have been induced to give up far more precious things than an ambition of that sort." Elsie was gazing out of the window. He pointed out a country club and several fine estates at a distance, then asked: "What is your friend going in for, Elsie, comedy or tragedy?" Elsie didn't know. She explained that while Miss M-Marley seemed like an old friend, she had only met her on the train as they had left Chicago. "Ah, that's just like your mother!" he exclaimed. "She was just that way, quick to make friends, and yet as loyal and true as any slower and more cautious person could be." Again he sighed; then added in a lighter tone: "_She_ wanted to play tragic parts--youth is apt to--but of course with those dimples she would have been doomed to comedy, if not farce." He gazed reminiscently at her. "Your baby pictures had her dimples in small, but I see that as you have grown thin you have lost them. You scarcely resemble her at all, and yet already I see how very like her you are." Elsie could think of no response, and fearing that he was awaking painful feelings, Mr. Middleton changed the subject by inquiring kindly after her stepmother. Elsie replied according to instructions that she was quite well and much gratified to have secured her former position in one of the San Francisco high schools for the coming year.