‘Didn’t I tell you that I say everything that comes into my head? Oh, Madoline, don’t for pity’s sake think that I envy you your wealth—you who have been so good to me, you who are all I have to love in this world! It is not the money I care for. I think I would just as soon be poor as rich, if I could be free to roam the world, like a man. But to live in a great house, waited on by an army of servants, and to know that I am nobody, of no account, a mere waif, the penniless daughter of a penniless mother—that wounds me to the quick.’ ‘My dearest, my pet, what a false, foolish notion! Do you think anybody in this house values you less because I have a fortune tied to me by all manner of parchment deeds, and you have no particular settlement, and have only expectations from a not over-rich father? Do you think you are not admired for your grace and pretty looks, and that by-and-by there will not come the best substitute which modern life can give for the prince of our dear old fairy tales—a good husband, who will be wealthy enough to give my darling all she can desire in this world?’ ‘I’m sure I shall hate him, whoever he may be,’ said Daphne, with a short, impatient sigh. Madoline looked at her earnestly, with the tender motherly look which came naturally to the beautiful face when the elder sister looked at the younger. She had put aside her crewel-work at the beginning of this conversation, and had given all her attention to Daphne. ‘Why do you say that, dearest?’ she asked gravely. ‘Oh, I don’t know, really. But I’m sure I shall never marry.’ ‘Isn’t it rather early to make up your mind on that point?’ ‘Why should it be? Hasn’t one a mind and a heart at seventeen as well as at seven-and-twenty? I should like well enough to have a very rich husband by-and-by, so that, instead of being Daphne, the pauper, I might be Mrs. Somebody, with ever so much a year settled upon me for ever and ever. But I don’t believe I shall ever see anybody I shall be able to care for.’ ‘I hope, darling, you haven’t taken it into your foolish head that you care for some one already. School-girls are so silly.’ ‘And generally fall in love with the dancing-master,’ said Daphne, with a laugh. ‘I think I tried rather hard to do that, but I couldn’t succeed. The poor man wore a wig; a dreadfully natural, dreadfully curly wig; like the pictures of Lord Byron. No, Lina; I pledge you my word that no dancing-master’s image occupies my breast.’ ‘I am glad to hear it,’ answered Madoline. ‘I hope there is no one else.’ Daphne blushed rosy red. She took a gardenia from the low glass vase on her sister’s work-table, where the white waxen flowers were clustered in the centre of a circle of purple pansies, and began to pick the petals off slowly, one by one. ‘He loves me—loves me not,’ she whispered softly, smiling all the while at her own foolishness, till the smile faded slowly at sight of the barren stem.