"It is all over now, and this is idle talk, Mattie. I have given up all thought of him, as he has given up all thought of me—and perhaps it is for the best," she added.
"We will hope so, Harriet."
"I was always a foolish and vain girl, prone to change my mind, and scarcely knowing what that mind was," she said bitterly. "It is easy enough to forget."
Mattie scarcely understood her. She shook her head in dissent, and would have turned the conversation by asking after her father's health—Harriet's own health, which was not very evident on her pale cheeks just then. Harriet darted away from the subject.
"Well—all well," she said; "and how is Sidney in health, you have not told me that?"
"Better in health. I have said that his mind is more at ease."
"Mattie, though I have given him up for ever, though I know that I am nothing to him now, and deserve to be nothing, let me see him again! I am going into the country with father for a week or two, and should like to see him once more before I go."
"Harriet, you love him still! You are not glad that it is all ended between you!"
"I should have been here in your place—I have a right to be here!" she said, evasively.
"Tell him so."