Once the nurse had expressed
some wonder at the distance at which Ellinor could hear her father's
approach, saying that she had listened and could not hear a sound, to
which Ellinor had replied:
"Of course you cannot; he is not your papa!"
Then, when he went away in the morning, after he had kissed her, Ellinor
would run to a certain window from which she could watch him up the lane,
now hidden behind a hedge, now reappearing through an open space, again
out of sight, till he reached a great old beech-tree, where for an
instant more she saw him. And then she would turn away with a sigh,
sometimes reassuring her unspoken fears by saying softly to herself,
"He will come again to-night."
Mr. Wilkins liked to feel his child dependent on him for all her
pleasures. He was even a little jealous of anyone who devised a treat or
conferred a present, the first news of which did not come from or through
him.
At last it was necessary that Ellinor should have some more instruction
than her good old nurse could give. Her father did not care to take upon
himself the office of teacher, which he thought he foresaw would
necessitate occasional blame, an occasional exercise of authority, which
might possibly render him less idolized by his little girl; so he
commissioned Lady Holster to choose out one among her many _protegees_
for a governess to his daughter.
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