One would have supposed that a remark like this, uttered in a calm, mild tone, a tone of mingled dignity and affability, would have touched a heart of only fifteen summer's growth, but Mittie knew not yet that she had a heart. She had never yet really loved a human being. Insensible to the sweet tendernesses of nature, it was reserved for the lightning bolt of passion to shiver the hard, bark-like covering, and penetrate to the living core. She triumphed in the thought that in the struggle for power between her step-mother and herself she had gained the ascendency, that she had never yielded one iota of her will, never called her _mother_, or acknowledged her legitimate and sacred claims. She began to despise the woman, who was weak enough, as she believed, to be overruled by a young girl like herself. But she did not know Mrs. Gleason--as a scene which occurred just one year after her return will show. Mittie was seated in her own room, where she always remained, save when company called expressly to see her. She never assisted her mother either in discharging the duties of hospitality or in performing those little household offices which fall so gracefully on the young. Engrossed with her books and studies, pursuits noble and ennobling in themselves, but degraded from their high and holy purpose when cultivated to the exclusion of the lovely, feminine virtues, Mittie was almost a stranger beneath her father's roof. The chamber in which she was seated bore elegant testimony to the kindness and liberality of her step-mother--who, before Mittie's return from school, had prepared and furnished this apartment expressly for her two young daughters. As Mittie was the eldest, and to be the first occupant, her supposed tastes were consulted, and her imagined wants all anticipated. Mrs. Gleason had a small fortune of her own, so that she was not obliged to draw upon her husband's purse when she wished to be generous. She had therefore spared no expense in making this room a little sanctum-sanctorum, where youth would delight to dwell. "Mittie loves books," she said, and she selected some choice and elegant works to fill the shelves of a swinging library--of course she must be fond of paintings, and the walls were adorned with pictures whose gilded frames relieved their soft, neutral tint. "Young girls love white. It is the appropriate livery of innocence." Therefore bed-curtains, window-curtains, and counterpane were of the dazzling whiteness of snow. Even the table and washstand were white, ornamented with gilded wreaths. "Mittie was fond of writing--all school girls are," therefore an elegant writing desk must be ready for her use--and though her love of sewing was more doubtful, a beautiful workbox was ready for her accommodation. She well knew the character of Mittie, and her personal opposition to herself, but she was determined to overcome her prejudices, and bind her to her by every endearing obligation.