articles of furniture, and Thankful laughed. And then the light
was lit; and her father, a gray wrinkled man of sixty, still
holding her hand, stood before her.

"You have been out, mistress!"

"I have," said Thankful.

"And not alone," growled the old man angrily.

"No," said Mistress Thankful, with a smile that began in the
corners of her brown eyes, ran down into the dimpled curves of her
mouth, and finally ended in the sudden revelation of her white
teeth,--"no, not alone."

"With whom?" asked the old man, gradually weakening under her
strong, saucy presence.

"Well, father," said Thankful, taking a seat on a table, and
swinging her little feet somewhat ostentatiously toward him, "I was
with Capt. Allan Brewster of the Connecticut Contingent."

"That man?"

"That man!"

"I forbid you seeing him again."

Thankful gripped the table with a hand on each side of her, to
emphasize the statement, and swinging her feet replied,--