e-pipe. It wasn't high
enough to walk straight. I don't like Alexandria. It's all mud and
secessionists. People looked cross, and Joy was afraid they'd shoot us.
We saw the house where Col. Ellsworth was shot at the beginning of the
war. The man was very polite, and showed us round. The plastering around
the place where he fell, and _all the stairs_, had been cut away by
people as relics. We saw the church where Gen. Washington used to go,
too."

JOY'S JOURNAL

"Wednesday Night.

"We are just home from Mount Vernon and we've had a splendid time. We
went in a steamboat; it's some way from Washington. You can go by land,
if you want to. It was real pleasant. Gen. Washington's house was
there,--a queer, low old place, and we went all over it. There was a
nice garden, and beautiful grounds, with woods clear down to the water.
He is buried on the place under a marble tomb, with a sort of brick shed
all around it. There is nothing on the tomb but the word Washington. His
wife is buried by him, and it says on hers, Martha, Consort of
Washington. All the gentlemen took off their hats while we stood there.
To-morrow we are going to Manassas, if there is a boat. Uncle is going
to see. I am having a splendid time. Won't it be nice telling father all
about it when he comes home?"

[Illustration]

Joy laid down her pen suddenly. She heard a strange noise in her uncle's
room where he and Gypsy were sitting. It was a sort of cry,--a low,
smothered cry, as of some one in grief or pain. She shut up her
portfolio and hurried in. Mr. Breynton held a paper in his hand. Gypsy
was looking over his shoulder, and her face was very pale.

"What is it? What's the matter?"

Nobody answered.

Mr. Breynton turned away his face. Gypsy broke out crying.

"Why, what _is_ the matter?" said Joy, looking alarmed.

"Joy, my poor child--" began her uncle. But Gypsy sprang forward
suddenly, and threw her arms around Joy's neck.

"Oh, Joy, Joy,--your father!"

"Let me see that paper!" Joy caught it before they could stop her,
opened it, read it,--dropped it slowly. It was a telegram from
Yorkbury:--

"_Boston papers say Joy's father died in France two weeks ago._"

CHAPTER XIII

A SUNDAY NIGHT

They were all together in the parlor at Yorkbury--Joy very still, with
her head in her auntie's lap. It was two weeks now since that night when
she sat writing in her journal at Washington, and planning so happily
for the trip to Manassa