"Pshaw, Rachel," said Hetty, resolutely. "That is all nonsense. It is just the nervous fancy of a sick girl. You mustn't give way to it." "I should think so too," replied Rachel, meekly. "If it did not so often come exactly true. My father will tell you how often we have tried it." "Well, then, tell me what I was thinking just now," laughed Hetty. Rachel colored. "I would rather not," she replied, in an earnest tone. "Oh! you're afraid it won't prove true," said Hetty. "I'll take the risk, if you will." Rachel hesitated, but finally repeated her first answer. "I would rather not." Hetty persisted, and Rachel, with great reluctance, answered her as follows: "You were thinking about yourself: you were dissatisfied about something in yourself; you are not happy, and you ought to be; you are so good." Hetty listened with a wonder-struck face. She disliked this more than she had ever in her life disliked any thing which had happened to her. She did not speak. "Do not be angry," said Rachel. "You made me tell you." "Oh! I am not angry," said Hetty. "I'm not so stupid as that; but it's the most disagreeable thing, I ever knew. Can you help seeing these things, if you try?" "Yes, I suppose I might," said Rachel. "I never try. It interests me to see what people are thinking about." "Humph!" said Hetty, sarcastically. "I should think so. You might make your fortune as a detective, if you were well enough to go about in the world." "If I were that, I should lose the power," replied Rachel. "The doctors say it is part of the disease." "Rachel," exclaimed Hetty, vehemently, "I'll never come near you again, if you don't promise not to use this power of yours upon me. I should never feel comfortable one minute where you are, if I thought you were reading my thoughts. Not that I have any special secrets," added Hetty, with a guilty consciousness; "but I suppose everybody thinks thoughts he would rather not have read." "I'll promise you, indeed I will, dear Mrs. Williams," cried Rachel, much distressed. "I never have read you, except that first day. It seemed forced upon me then, and to-day too. But I promise you, I will not do it again." "I suppose I shouldn't know if you were doing it, unless you told me," said Hetty, reflectively. "I think you would," answered Rachel. "Do I not look peculiarly? My father tells me that I do." "Yes, you do," replied Hetty, recollecting that, in each of these instances, she had been much disturbed by Rachel's look. "I will trust you, then, seeing that you probably can't deceive me." When Hetty told the doctor of this, expecting that he would dismiss it as unworthy of attention, she was much surprised at the interest he showed in the account. He questioned her closely as to the expression of Rachel's face, her tones of voice, during the interval. "And was it true, Hetty?" he asked; "was what she said true? Were you thinking of something in yourself which troubled you?"