"And how dare you speak so to me, foolish girl? Is Cornelius anything so near to you as he is to me? Did you rear him, sacrifice your youth to him, and then find yourself cast aside and forsaken, as I am this day?" "He reared me," I cried, weeping passionately. "Claim him by all you have sacrificed to him, my claim is all he has been to me! Oh! Kate, why did he go?" "What right have you to know?" she asked, with a jealous bitterness that exasperated me. "Every right," I replied, indignantly. "What have I done to be so treated?" "What have you done? Why, you have done that I believe there is nothing so dear to him as you are; that his last request was, that instead of going with him, I should stay with you and wait your wakening; that his last kiss was that which he gave you as you slept. If you want to know more, here is a letter for you. Ask me not another question; I shall not answer. I have no more to say, and I have enough of my own grief." She handed me a folded paper. I opened it and read:-- "Forgive me, Daisy, if I forsake you thus by stealth; but partings are bitter things. I wished to spare you some pain, and myself a severe though useless trial. I had promised to leave you and Kate no more; but you must have noticed how restless my temper has been of late; indeed, there is in my blood an unquiet fever which only liberty and a life of wandering can appease. Good bye, Daisy, God bless you! May you be happy, ay, even to the fullness of your heart's wishes." Kate need not have asked for my silence. I laid down her brother's letter without a word, not a syllable could I have uttered then; I was hurt; hurt to the very heart. Cornelius had forsaken me cruelly; he had done to the girl what pity would never have let him do to the child; he had left me in my sleep, without one word of adieu. I felt the shock and bitterness of this sudden separation, and more bitterly still the desertion. How could I, after this, think that Cornelius cared for me? He had liked me, amused himself with me, but I had never been to him that living portion of the heart which we call a friend. I could bear his absence, but that he should not care for me, that he should have been trifling with me all along, I could not bear. I paced the room up and down, vainly trying to keep in my sobs and tears. As I passed by the table, a folded paper caught my attention, I seized it eagerly with that vague hope which clings to everything. In this case it was not deceived. "Oh! Kate, Kate!" I cried, throwing my arms around her neck in a transport of joy too deep not to make me forget the few sharp words that had passed between us. "Well, what is it?" she asked, amazed. "He'll come back; he'll come back; he has forgotten his passport. Oh! I am so glad! so happy; he can't travel without it, you know. I defy him to go to Spain now." I laughed and cried for joy. She sighed.