"But she spoke of you so kindly the other day, and said that she could not bear to see you in such bad spirits, and that she was so sorry about poor Edward; and then she told me that in some things she thought you were like him."
"Me! no indeed, nobody could think that; he was like no one else."
"Not Frank?" asked Amy, anxious to make her cousin converse upon the subject she knew was uppermost in her thoughts.
"No," replied Dora; "Frank is thoughtless and hasty, but he never said a harsh word to any one, not to me even!"
"It would have been hard to speak crossly to you, when you were so fond of him," said Amy.
"Ah! you don't know," answered Dora, while a host of recollections flashed across her mind, of taunting looks, and angry words, and selfish actions, which at the time were thought of as nothing, but which now stood forth in their true light. For a short time she was silent; and then, turning abruptly to Amy, she said, "Then you will come next Monday—aunt Herbert is to have the green room and the boudoir, and you are to have the dressing-room."
Amy was vexed; she longed to continue the conversation about Edward, and she was always pleased and interested when Dora spoke of her own feelings, for it seemed as if she were then admitted to a secret which no one else was allowed to share. "I shall like it very much if mamma will consent, and if you will be happy," she said; "only I wish there were to be no strangers."
"Don't think about me," replied Dora, "and pray don't say anything about my being out of spirits; I shall do very well by and by."
"I wish Frank were here," said Amy.
"Frank will do no good, only make a noise; but I shall be happy again after Christmas. I did not think half so much about it a month ago, and not even when first I came here, because everything was new; but he always came home about this time, and I used to look forward to it so—at last I quite counted the days."