A BITTER DISAPPOINTMENT.

A girl was walking up and down in the foggy light of an ill-trimmed lamp, which was the sole illumination of a little room directly under the attic in which the musician Weeks, kept his humble household. She was a strange-looking, beautiful creature, in spite of her common-place garments, and a certain free movement, which bespoke more impatience than she could well control. Every few minutes, she would go to the window and look out, then pause to listen, and with a stamp of the foot, begin to pace the room again.

Directly the door opened, and Weeks looked in with a sparkling smile on his good-natured face. Constance turned quickly and came toward him.

"I've got the order, Miss Constance; seats for two, just one row back from where you sat the other night."

"Oh, give them to me. Let me look. How good you are."

"Not at all—don't mention it," said Weeks, beaming satisfaction from his eyes, but deprecating her thanks with a modest wave of the hand; "good night, I must be off to the theatre."

The door closed, and Weeks ran down stairs, his light feet giving back a pleasant sound, as they pattered upon the steps.

Constance ran up stairs, and looked into the room where Rhoda was at work.

"Where is Luke; I want him," she said half out of breath.

"Luke hasn't come in yet," answered Rhoda.

"Oh mercy! what shall I do; here is an order for the theatre, and I want some one to go for Mr. Sterling."

"I—I'll go," said Rhoda with cheerful good nature, and she began to tie on her hood at once.

"That's a darling, good soul. I wouldn't let you take the trouble, Rhoda, but one does not get a chance to see a play often and your father has been so good."

"He always is as good as gold," said Rhoda. "There, I'm all ready. Got a note or anything, or shall I only say he's wanted?"

"That will be enough, Rhoda."

"I should think so!"

Away went Rhoda on her errand, and Constance Hudson returned to her little sitting-room, so anxious that she could not rest. In order to save time she went into a bedroom that opened upon that miserable apology for a parlor, and gave some really artistic touches to her hair, fastened a knot of blue ribbon to the bosom of her cheap delaine dress, and put on a jaunty little hat which made her dashing style of beauty really overpowering.

"There now, I am quite ready," she said, pouring some cheap perfume on a handkerchief edged with imitation lace. "Why don't he come?"

Constance began to pace the room again in her impatience; this was a great event for her, poor girl. It was not as she said, often that a chance to visit the theatre came in her way, and that was all the dissipation yet known to her. To understand her ardent longing, one must be young and isolated as she was, poor thing!

It seemed a full hour before Rhoda came back with word that she could not find Mr. Sterling, who had gone out, but she had left word that he was wanted.

Constance received this news with a passionate gesture, and her disappointment broke forth on little Rhoda, who was fortunately out of hearing, having run up stairs like a deer, eager to go on with her work.

The disappointment which fell upon Constance was really distressing. She flung off her hat and put it on again half a dozen times, walked the room, leaned out of the window, laid her hot cheeks against the stone cill, and resolved to be patient till some sound of his coming reached her, but in half a minute began her feverish walk again.

The hours wore on: it was getting almost too late for any hopes of going out, and Constance gave way entirely. She tossed her hat into a corner, flung herself into a chair, and burying her face in her perfumed handkerchief soon deluged its cheap lace with tears.

All at once she heard a step, and sprang to her feet breathless; snatched up her hat and tried to look unconcerned as she settled it on her head; but the effort only made her agitation more apparent, for her face was flushed with weeping, and her lips had not ceased to tremble through the joyful smile that broke over them like sunshine on rosebuds.

"He is coming, he is coming," she cried out, as if her own voice would endorse the fact, and turning to look at a painted clock that stood on a high wooden mantle-piece, she saw, that it would not be so very late when they reached the theatre, after all. In the tumult of her happiness she had forgotten the step, but it sounded again nearer the door. The color left her face, her heart fell like lead in her bosom, and she sank into a chair.

"Oh, it is father—only that," she called, "and he will be glad that I am disappointed. I wont let him see it—I wont."

Again she took off her hat, tossed it through the bedroom door, and, moving her seat, pretended to be looking out of the window; though her bosom heaved with rage against her father, that his step should have deceived her so.

The door opened softly, and a tall man, meanly dressed, but neat and gentlemanly in spite of that, came into the room.

"What, alone, Constance!" he said.

"Alone," answered the girl pettishly; "why not. Who is there in this house to keep me company?"

"I thought, perhaps, little Rhoda."

"Little Rhoda, indeed; I am sick of her."

"Or Luke, with his music; you never tire of that, I am sure."

"Yes, I do; one must know something of music to enjoy it, and I know nothing of that—or anything else, how should I?"

Constance said this with bitter emphasis. She almost hated her father just then, and was seized with a cruel wish to wound him.

He looked at her with trouble in his eyes, but said nothing. Then she broke out again—

"So you are ready to go out—out—out—out all night long, and I at home so lonesome that the very mice in the ceiling are company. I wonder what people have children for, if it is only to let them live in such a way as this; for my part, I wish I had never been born. So you _will_ go out and leave me alone?"

It was wonderful, the patience with which the father of this girl submitted to these upbraidings. He answered her kindly, almost humbly:

"But I must go, Constance, I have promised."

"You are always promising, father; always out when I most need you. It's right down cruel to treat any child as I am treated."

"Hush, Constance, do not blame me. I am trying to be kind—trying to act rightly."

"Was it acting rightly to refuse me money enough to buy a feather for my hat, and put the last cent in your pocket as you did just now; you are always doing it, and not a shilling ever comes back."

The man thus harshly reproached, turned his large gray eyes upon the girl with such mournful earnestness that she softened a little.

"Oh father, you would not blame me if you knew how I wanted the feather, and how I have been disappointed."

The man took some fractional currency from his pocket, counted it over with a troubled look, but put it resolutely back again.

"I cannot give you the money to-night, Constance; wait a little and you shall have it."

The girl burst into a passion of tears.

"There, it is always so. I suppose you will be out all night, and come home without a cent. I declare I won't stand it; it's a burning shame for a man of your age to spend his nights as you do."

"Constance!"

The pain expressed by that one word thrilled through and through the angry girl, and told her how cruel she had been; but while she was struggling with herself, the door softly closed and her father disappeared. Impulsive alike in her anger and in her repentance, Constance sprang up, snatched her hat, threw a veil over it and ran after him.