"Then I won't have him at all," I replied, rather provoked: "I did not want him, Kate, and you know it too. I want to stay with Cornelius."
"Mrs. O'Reilly may have a word or two to say to that," very quietly observed Kate.
I felt Cornelius start like one who receives the sting of a sudden pain, but he did not contradict his sister. Mrs. O'Reilly! the mere name was hateful to me. I did not reply; Kate continued—
"You look quite charmed at the idea of your Papa marrying."
"No girl ever liked a stepmother yet," I answered, reddening.
"Then you will be an exception, I am sure," very gravely said Cornelius.
I was not at all sure of that; but I did not dare to say so. He saw very well that I was anything but cured of my old jealousy; and though I believe nothing was then further from his thoughts than marriage, he insisted on this point, to warn me, I suppose, of the necessity of self- subjection.
"You must be the governess of the children," he said.
"Yes, of course she must," decisively said Kate.
I turned on her triumphantly: