Three times before, he had heard her speak of her aching head, and now, with an impatient gesture, he was turning away, when his mother said, “Poor girl, she really looks miserable. I think a ride would do her good. Suppose you take her with you—I heard you say you were going to Versailles.” If there was anything in which Mabel excelled, it was horsemanship, she being a better rider, if possible; than ’Lena, and now, at Mrs. Livingstone’s proposition, she looked up eagerly at John Jr., who replied, “Oh, hang it all! mother, I can’t always be bothered with a girl;” then as he saw how Mabel’s countenance fell, he continued, “Let ’Lena ride with her—she wants to, I know.” “Certainly,” said ’Lena, whose heart warmed toward the orphan girl, partly because she was an orphan, and partly because she saw that she was neglected and unloved. As yet Mabel cared nothing for John Jr., nor even suspected his mother’s object in detaining her as a guest. So when ’Lena was proposed as a substitute she seemed equally well pleased, and the young man, as he walked off to order the ponies, mentally termed himself a bear for his rudeness; “for after all,” thought he, “it’s mother who has designs upon me, not Mabel. She isn’t to blame.” This opinion once satisfactorily settled, it was strange how soon John Jr. began to be sociable with Mabel, finding her much more agreeable than he had at first supposed, and even acknowledging to ’Lena that “she was a good deal of a girl, after all, were it not for her everlasting headaches and the smell of medicine,” which he declared she always carried about with her. “Hush-sh,” said ’Lena—“you shan’t talk so, for she is sick a great deal, and she does not feign it, either.” “Perhaps not,” returned John Jr., “but she can at least keep her _miserable feelings_ to herself. Nobody wants to know how many times she’s been blistered and bled!” Still John Jr. acknowledged that there were somethings in Mabel which he liked, for no one could live long with her and not admire her gentleness and uncommon sweetness of disposition, which manifested itself in numerous little acts of kindness to those around her. Never before in her life had she been so constantly associated with a young gentleman, and as she was quite susceptible, it is hardly more than natural that erelong thoughts of John Jr. mingled in both her sleeping and waking dreams. She could not understand him, but the more his changeful moods puzzled her, the more she felt interested in him, and her eyes would alternately sparkle at a kind word from him, or fill with tears at the abruptness of his speeches; while he seemed to take special delight in seeing how easily he could move her from one extreme to the other.