She threw the letters over to him, and sat, with parted lips and wondering--and rather scared--face, looking into the fire, with her hands clasped tightly in her lap.
"This is not fun, Grace dear," her brother said gravely at last. It had taken him a terrible long time to read those very short letters, but he read so much more in them than was actually written. "It is sober earnest, and a very grave matter."
"But I don't want---- Oh!--I wish they hadn't"--with passionate fervour. "Why can't they let things go on as they are? We have been so happy----"
"Yes. . . . But time works its changes. They are no longer boys----"
A wriggle of dissent from Grace.
"----Although they may seem so to us. And you are no longer a little girl----"
"Oh! I feel like a speck of dust, Charlie; and I don't, don't, don't want----"
"I know, dear; but it is too late. You may feel a little girl to-day. Last night you were an exquisitely beautiful woman--and this is the result."
Grace put her hands up to her face and began to cry softly. For there, in the dancing flames, she had seen in a flash what it all must mean--severances, heart-aches, trouble generally. And they had all been so happy.
Eager wisely let her have her cry out. When, at last, she mopped up her eyes, and sat looking pensively into the fire again, he said quietly: