"Will you feel badly when I'm gone, Aunt Soph?" Cornelia asked after the news had been broken. She looked wistfully into the spinster's face, and felt herself answered as she noted the involuntary momentary hesitation which preceded the reply. "It will naturally be a disappointment to me to miss seeing my brother, but I hope the pleasure is only deferred. I am glad to have had an opportunity of making your acquaintance, my dear, though the time is so curtailed." "Yes, I guess we've fixed-up an acquaintance right enough!" said Cornelia, quietly. Seven weeks, or seven years--what did it matter? She and this woman could never become friends. Time counts for nothing in the intercourse of souls. An hour may reveal a kindred spirit; no years can bridge some gaps. Elma would remain a life-long friend, Guest a life-long memory, but her kinswoman, the nearest on earth with the one exception of her father, must for ever be a stranger. Cornelia was sad at heart that day, and Elma was sad, too; opening wide, startled eyes, and clasping her friend in jealous arms. "Cornelia, it isn't true! It _can't_ be true! I can't spare you, dear. Is it really impossible to stay on a little longer? Geoffrey and I counted on you for our wedding. It is fixed for October, and I wanted you for a bridesmaid. I wanted you to pay me a visit in my own house! You have been such a friend to us both, that we _need_ you, Cornelia! I shall miss you badly!" "Shucks!" returned Cornelia, lightly. "You'll forget there is such a creature in existence. _I_ should, in your place, and I don't mind if you do, for I know you'll remember again another day. This is Geoffrey's hour, and I won't interfere. If I live, I'll pay you that visit right enough, and maybe you'll come over to see me. I'd give you a roaring time. Tell Geoffrey he is bound to bring you over to see America. I'll think about you on your marriage-day, but I don't know as I'm sorry to do the thinking at a distance. Wedding-days aren't the liveliest occasions in the world for the looker-on. I guess I'd feel pretty `_left_,' when you drove off from the gates, and I found myself all by my lonesome with the two old girls. ... I've wired to Liverpool about berths, and may have to start off at a day's notice, so we've got to make the most of the time. Aunt Soph don't care! She's polite, of course, but right at the back of her mind I can see she's planning to clean out my room, and thinking how good it will be to have the mats laid aside, and the shroudings over the tables! If it wasn't for you, Moss Rose, I should feel I'd done a fool-trick coming over at all! When all's said and done it amounts to nothing but disappointment and heart- break."