She counted on her fingers. One, two, three--sixteen. "I don't know anything about it! Be quiet! You're a magpie--nothing but chatter, chatter, chatter!" and he didn't speak them--he growled them. So he can't care. I shall come, Chris,'--pressing close to my mother coaxingly--'and we'll take a nice long walk.' 'Very well, my dear,' said my mother, with a smile; 'but I _must_ ask your uncle, Chris.' I mapped out in my mind the pleasantest walk I knew, and on the following night, when work was over, I hastened into the street; but neither my mother nor Jessie was there. I looked about for them, and waited for a quarter of an hour, and then raced home. Only my mother was in the house. 'Why didn't you come, mother?' I asked. 'I've been waiting ever so long. And where's Jessie?' 'My dear,' replied my mother, with her arm around my waist, 'Jessie has gone.' 'Gone! Oh, for a walk with uncle Bryan, I suppose?' 'No, my dear; she has gone away altogether.' CHAPTER XIV. THE WORLD BECOMES BRIGHT AGAIN. 'Gone away altogether!' I echoed the words, but the news was so sudden and unexpected that for a few moments I did not quite understand their meaning. I had never, until the last fortnight, had a friend so nearly of my own age as Jessie; and the companionship had been to me so sweet and delightful, and so altogether new, that to lose it now seemed like losing the best part of my life. I released myself from my mother's embrace, and ran upstairs to her bedroom, to look for Jessie's box. It was gone, and the room was in all respects the same as it had been before Jessie's arrival. Until that time it had always worn a cheerful aspect in my eyes, but now it looked cold and desolate; the happy experiences of the last two weeks seemed to me like a dream--but a dream which, now that it had passed away, filled my heart with pain. 'Her box is gone,' I said, with quivering lips, when I rejoined my mother. 'It was taken away this morning, my dear.' 'That shows that she is not coming back; and I shall never, never see her again!' My mother did not reply. The feeling that now stole upon me was one of resentment towards uncle Bryan. Who was to blame but he? From the first he had behaved harshly towards her. He saw that we were fond of her, and he was jealous of her. He was always cold and unsympathetic and unkind. Every unreasonable suggestion that presented itself to me with reference to him, I welcomed and accepted as an argument against him; and to this effect I spoke hotly and intemperately. 'Chris, Chris, my dear!' remonstrated my mother; 'you should not have hard thoughts towards your uncle.' 'I can't help it; he almost asks for them. He won't let us like him--he won't! I don't care if he hears me say so.' 'He can't hear you, my dear; he went away with Jessie this morning.' 'Where to?' 'I have no idea, Chris; he did not tell me.' 'And wouldn't, if you had asked,' I said bitterly.