That room, all its life, had never looked so homelike, and the reason was not explainable; for, except in the heap of litter at one end of the table, and the old man eating his luncheon hard by, there was absolutely no change upon the apartment. That soldier's face, weatherworn and brown, full of command yet full of tenderness, with grizzled hair and moustache, and erect soldierly _pose_, was not by any means a common-place countenance, or one which could have passed unnoted anywhere; but it was not even that which made the charm. It was the bright, pleased look which the Colonel, as he sat, lifted upon the girl before him--the amused, kind, tender smile which went over all his face like sunshine--the kindly, homely inclination towards her of that deaf ear--the care he took to hear all she said--the interest and indulgent regard with which he followed her movements and listened to her words. There was no criticism in those kind eyes--they were eyes accustomed to give a genial interpretation of everything--and the light of them changed the aspect of this dismal room. It did not even look so dark or so stifling--the very mahogany brightened, and hearty blazes awoke in the once-smouldering fire. Everything seemed to have become aware, somehow, that living human love and kindness, indulgence, tenderness were there. Yes, indulgence--though, to be sure, it is very bad to spoil our children; but what would not one give, when one grows old, for that dear, lost indulgence of our youth, which will never come back to us--that consciousness that there is one at least who will see everything we do in the best light, and put the kindest construction upon our failings, and think us cleverer and better, and fairer and pleasanter, than we are and can be! Youth cannot thrive at all without this sunshine; but heaven help us, how it dies and disappears out of the noon of life! Susan had never once felt it before--the feeling came upon her, as she met her uncle's eyes, that she had never really lived before--that she was only awaking to find out what she herself was, and what were the people around her. Somehow the dawning of a happiness unthought of brought with it the sudden revelation of miseries which had not struck her in all her past experience. Fathers, it became visible to her in a moment, were not all like her father--homes were different from this home--even Uncle Edward's presents helped that enlightenment. These pretty things were common to girls of her own age, and in ordinary use among them. Her uncle was even puzzled that she should look at them as she did, and think them so beautiful, so wonderful, so much "too fine for _me_!" And as Susan came to comprehend this, between the pleasure and the pain, her cheeks flushed, her young limbs trembled, her heart beat loud with strange emotion. Even that excitement helped the effect of Uncle Edward's kind face in the room. This very confusion and commotion was life.