"Oh, thank you, you are very kind, and I _am_ tired. It always makes me tired and ill to cry, and I look so like a fright, too. I wish I might be improved by tears, like the heroines in novels we read about; but I am not so fortunate as they." "Have you read many novels?" asked Dolores, as she hung up a neat blue walking suit, secretly wondering if that color could be becoming to her dusky companion. "Oh, no, not many. Mamma thinks I am too young to read the best novels understandingly, and she does not like to have me read anything for just the story of it. I have read all of Mrs. Whitney's books; they are the sweetest stories in the world for girls to read, mamma says, and I think so, too. They always make me feel braver and better, and more contented. I have read two or three books that made me discontented; the heroines were so wonderfully gifted and so gloriously beautiful that I fairly hated my poor self for days after reading about them." Dolores smiled. "That is very odd," she said, "I do not remember to ever have been affected in that way by a book." Helena cast an admiring glance upon her companion. "Well, I should not suppose you would be?" she responded, "because you are more beautiful than any heroine I ever read about, and that makes all the difference in the world, you know." Dolores let a whole arm full of mantles and dresses fall in a heap upon the floor, as she turned and stared at the speaker. "Are you making sport of me?" she asked, bluntly. "I, making sport of you? Why, I would not be so rude," cried Helena, the tears starting to her eyes again. "Perhaps I ought not to have spoken so plainly--may be you think 'praise to the face is an open disgrace;' but I do not believe that. If I like any thing or any body, I can not help saying so; and I thought you must know how very beautiful you are, and I spoke of it just as I would speak of the beauty of a flower or a picture. I am sorry if I have annoyed you." Dolores picked up the scattered garments and began to arrange them in order. "Well, you are the oddest girl I ever met," she said. "But you have not annoyed me; I am sure it is very sweet of you to say such pretty things to me; only I never knew any girl who talked like that before: girls are usually so hateful, you know." "Are they?" and there was real grief in Helena's voice. "Oh, I don't like to believe that is true." "But have not you found them so?" "No; but you see I have known very few girls. I have lived very quietly at home, and I never even staid all night with a girl in my life--mamma never liked to have me. No doubt I have a great deal to learn, but I always longed for a sister, and I thought girls were very nice indeed."