"Come, Harry, don't this suit you? I thought it would."
"Miss Nina, you are too kind."
"No, I'm not, Harry; I am a selfish little concern, that's a fact," said she, turning away, and pretending not to see the feeling which agitated him.
"But, Harry, wasn't it droll, this morning, when all our people came up to get their presents! There was Aunt Sue, and Aunt Tike, and Aunt Kate, each one got a new sack pattern, in which they are going to make up the prints I brought them. In about two days our place will be flaming with aprons and sacks. And did you see Aunt Rose in that pink bonnet, with the flowers? You could see every tooth in her head! Of course, now they'll be taken with a very pious streak, to go to some camp-meeting or other, to show their finery. Why don't you laugh, Harry?"
"I do, don't I, Miss Nina?"
"You only laugh on your face. You don't laugh deep down. What's the matter? I don't believe it's good for you to read and study so much. Papa used to say that he didn't think it was good for"—
She stopped, checked by the expression on the face of her listener.
"For servants, Miss Nina, your papa said, I suppose."
With the quick tact of her sex, Nina perceived that she had struck some disagreeable chord in the mind of her faithful attendant, and she hastened to change the subject, in her careless, rattling way.