'A beauty, and no mistake. Why, Sarah, can't you see it?'
'I sees all there is to see in the family,' the housekeeper returned with a superior air.
'Then you see that. She's grown and changed uncommon, within a year.'
'She's a very sweet young lady,' Mrs. Barker agreed.
'And she's goin' to be a stunner for looks,' Christopher repeated, with that same sly observation of his sister's face. 'She'll be better-lookin' than ever her mother was.'
'Mrs. Gainsborough was a handsome woman too,' said the housekeeper. 'But Miss Esther's very promisin'--you're right there; she's very promisin'. She's just beginnin' to show what she will be.'
'She's got over her dumps lately uncommon. I judged the dumps was natural enough, sitiwated as she is; but she's come out of 'em. She's openin' up like a white camellia; and there ain't anythin' that grows that has less shadow to it; though maybe it ain't what you'd call a gay flower,' added Christopher thoughtfully.
'Is that them stiff white flowers as has no smell to 'em?'
'The same, Mrs. Barker--if you mean what I mean.'
'Then I wouldn't liken Miss Esther to no sich. She's sweet, she is, and she ain't noways stiff. She has just which I call the manners a young lady ought to have.'
'Can't beat a white camellia for manners,' responded Christopher jocularly.
So the servants saw what the father did not. I think he hardly knew even that Esther was growing taller.
One evening in the spring, Esther was as usual making tea for her father. As usual also the tea-time was very silent. The colonel sometimes carried on his reading alongside of his tea-cup; at other times, perhaps, he pondered what he had been reading.
'Papa,' said Esther suddenly, 'would it be any harm if I wrote a letter to Pitt?'
'Yes, papa; I would like it--I would like to write once.'
'I would like to tell him something that I think it would please him to hear.'
'It is just something about myself, papa,' Esther said, a little hesitatingly.
'You may write, and I will enclose it in a letter of mine.'
A day or two passed, and then Esther brought her letter. It was closed and sealed. The colonel took it and turned it over.
'There's a good deal of it,' he remarked. 'Was it needful to use so many words?'