The Senator's Favorite

The senator's pleading dark eyes met the anxious blue ones of his wife, and he said eagerly:

"Dearest, she wants to go so very, very much, and it will break her sweet little heart if you refuse. Besides, this is different from a regular ball, for thousands and thousands of people attend the Inauguration Ball just to see the new president. There will be a great crush as usual, and you will bring the girls home very soon, I know. So for this one time I think we may humor our baby's curiosity. Now dry your eyes, my pet."

"Oh, you darling! you darling!" cried Precious ecstatically, and lifted her face, all lovely and damp like a rain-washed rose. She embraced him rapturously, then flew to her mother.

"Mamma, you shall never repent this, for I'll be as good as gold hereafter."

Ethel had turned away and left the room with a frowning brow and darkly flashing eyes.

"He loves her best," she murmured bitterly. "He would never have yielded like that to my entreaties for anything against dear mamma's wish. Ah, why is it so? Am I not beautiful and good, and his elder daughter? Why should Precious be always first in my noble father's heart?"

That jealous heart-cry strikes the keynote of our story, dear reader, for had the senator not loved Precious best, this story of Ethel's temptation and her sister's suffering would never have been written.

Ethel Winans was bitterly unhappy.

Unhappy? and why?

Externally she had everything to make her blessed.

Young, beautiful, healthy, the fortunate daughter of a rich and distinguished statesman, this girl had

"But lain in the lilies
And fed on the roses of life."

But Milton has aptly written:

"The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven."

Ethel Winans' life stream had been poisoned at its very source by a baleful jealousy.

Those who knew her gifted father best were aware that his early married life had been embittered by the faults of a passionately jealous nature intent on supremacy in everything. This elder daughter had inherited his beauty and his temperament. Every parental influence was working against her happiness.

She went with a weary, listless step to her own apartments, and fell heavily upon a silken divan. Her red lips were trembling, and tears began to rain from her beautiful eyes.

"Why was I ever born?" she cried angrily. "No one cares for poor Ethel! Mamma, in spite of her denials, loves my brother Earle the best, and papa worships Precious. If I were dead they would scarcely miss me."

She began to pace up and down the luxurious room, her rich crimson silk gown trailing soundlessly over the thick velvet carpet, her loosened tresses pouring in a dusky torrent below her waist, her lovely jeweled hands writhing together in agony.

"How I love him, my noble, handsome father!" she cried. "But ever since Precious was born, before I was three years old, she has supplanted me in everything. I can remember it all although I was so young. She pushed me from my mother's breast, she crowded me from my father's heart. I was no longer the petted baby. I must give way to Little Blue Eyes, as they call her, and from the first I hated my rival. When I was little I used to strike her, until my mother's gentle teachings made me ashamed, and then I tried to love my little sister for mamma's sake. I do love her. God knows I love her, for who could help it, she is so sweet and lovely? Yet there are times—horrible times—when Satan seems to possess my soul, and I give way to something that is awful—to jealous hate and fury—and then, oh, then, I wish that Precious were dead, or that I had never been born. Once I confessed all to mamma, and she shuddered and wept at my wickedness. But she clasped me in her tender arms, and told me that she loved me—oh, very, very much and that she would pray for me daily! Dear mamma! she is an angel, and I am a wicked, rebellious girl, and frighten every one with my fits of temper and imperious ways. And I forget to pray for myself as mamma bade me do, and when I forget, the Evil One gets possession of my weak soul."

She fell on her knees, she lifted her streaming dark eyes heavenward.

"Oh, Heaven help me, make me a better girl, keep me from hating my dear little sister, and save me from my own evil nature!" she prayed, with desperate fervor.

CHAPTER II.

"LOVE TOOK UP THE GLASS OF TIME."

"Sister, since I met thee last,
O'er thy brow a change has passed.
In the softness of thine eyes
Deep and still a shadow lies.
From thy voice there thrills a tone
Never to thy childhood known;
Through thy soul a storm has moved;
Gentle sister, thou hast loved!"—Hemans.

It was the fourth day of March, and Washington was full of strangers drawn thither to witness the Inauguration ceremonies attendant upon the new president taking the oath of office as ruler of the nation.

But nature had frowned on everything that day, and from early dawn till midnight her tears poured in torrents upon the vast throngs that surged ceaselessly through the magnificent broad avenues of the beautiful city. The wind raged wildly, and the rain fell in sheets, as though

"The heart of heaven were breaking
In tears o'er the fallen earth."

Along the route of the procession, from the White House to the Capitol, Pennsylvania avenue was packed with a dense mass of people, upon whose forest of umbrellas the magnificent decorations of flags and bunting overhead dripped red and blue ink as they hung forlornly over the scene. The windows of the houses were filled with curious faces and the grand stands erected here and there for the sightseers were occupied, too, in spite of the weather, for no one seemed to have stayed indoors for fear of the elements. Hundreds of thousands of people seemed to be packed upon the pavements, jostling each other with their umbrellas, and patronizing the busy fakirs who peddled presidential badges and photographs, while ever and anon rose the plaintive call of the diligent vender of Philadelphia cough drops. Altogether the day was dismal in the extreme. The drenched people looked ridiculous, and the glory of the procession was considerably dampened from the same cause.

But the day with its stormy skies, its surging throngs, and fitful enthusiasm was over now. The new president was installed in the White House, the old president was deposed. "Le roi est mort! Vive le roi!"

Still Nature wept tumultuously, for with nightfall the storm increased in violence. Black, portentous clouds scurried over the face of the sky, and sheets of icy cold rain poured upon the earth.

But all this downpour did not check the ardor of the tens of thousands of people who flocked to the Inauguration Ball in the immense new Pension building. The avenues were thronged with carriages, and they literally blocked the square around the building, while within all was like fairy-land with splendid decorations, brilliant lights, black coats of civilians, gay uniforms of soldiers, brilliant costumes of foreign legations, and lovely women whose magnificent jewels radiated fire, while over all rose the swell of music. The new president was there with his family, and willful Precious Winans had duly made his acquaintance, the honor she had so much coveted.

And beautiful, passionate Ethel, with her flashing eyes and her proud smile?

Since we first met her several weeks ago a change has come over this reckless spirit.

The passion of love has thrown its golden glamour over her heart.

At a brilliant entertainment ten days ago she had met a stranger, an Englishman of rank and wealth, who was just now being lionized by American society.

Lord Chester was young, handsome, fascinating, and caused many a flutter in feminine hearts, but he soon singled out the brilliant belle, Miss Winans, as the bright particular star of his worship, and it was soon suspected that the girl, whose conquests had been legion in her two successful seasons, had been touched at last by Cupid's arrows. Society began to prophesy a match.

Ethel was radiant in the bliss of this dawning passion.

She foresaw, in a worshiping love and a brilliant marriage, an escape from the life that her jealous nature made at times unendurable.

"As Lady Chester I should leave my father's house, where Precious has supplanted me in all my rights. In my grand English home I should reign queen of my husband's heart, and in time the wounds of slighted love in my father's home might heal and be forgotten," she thought gladly, and there was triumph in the anticipation of this brilliant match, for she did not believe Precious could ever win a title, in spite of her charms.

"She is lovely, but she is not queenly, as I am. She would not grace a title," she thought proudly.

At the ball that night she wore Lord Chester's flowers, and he hung over her devotedly, but he had not yet seen Precious. Her mother kept her resolutely in the background. The senator's entreaties had forced her to bring her younger daughter, but she was determined that the girl's presence should not be known any more than could be helped. She wanted to keep this lovely pearl secluded from society as long as she could.

So, withdrawn into a flowery alcove with Precious, she scarcely mingled at all with the surging mass of people whose vast numbers made dancing quite an impossibility. The senator remained with them part of the time, but was often called off by friends, and sometimes left them to mingle with the crowd.

Precious, a perfect picture of beauty in a white Empire silk gown, with her golden curls all loose over her shoulders, remained demurely by her mother's side, the radiant light in her blue eyes and the flush on her cheeks showing how much she enjoyed the brilliant scene.

Suddenly a very distinguished looking man, white-haired, and in the uniform of some foreign service, with glittering orders on his breast, caught sight of Mrs. Winans in her secluded alcove, and hastened to speak to the beautiful lady.