“It is strange how Lilian and I came to love each other so much, when we are so unlike. Why, Oliver, they called me the spunkiest girl in the Seminary, and Lilian the most amiable; that’s when I first went there; but we did each other good, for she will occasionally show some spirit, while I try to govern my temper, and have not been angry in ever so long. You see, Lilian and I roomed together. I used to help her get her lessons; for somehow she couldn’t learn, and, if she sat next to me at recitation, I would tell her what to answer, until the teacher found it out, and made me stop. When Lilian first came to Charlestown, Lawrence was with her; she was fifteen then, and all the girls said they were engaged, they acted so. I don’t know how, but you can imagine, can’t you?”
Oliver thought he could, and Mildred continued: “I was present when he bade her good-by, and heard him say, ‘You’ll write to me, Fairy?’ that’s what he calls her. But Lilian would not promise, and he looked very sorry. After we had become somewhat acquainted, she said to me one day, ‘Milly, everybody says you write splendid compositions, and now, won’t you make believe you are me, and scribble off a few lines in answer to this?’ and she showed me a letter just received from Lawrence Thornton.
“I asked why she did not answer it herself, and she said, ‘Oh, I can’t; it would sicken him of me at once, for I don’t know enough to write decently; I don’t always spell straight, or get my grammar correct. I never know when to use to or too, or just where the capitals belong;’ so after a little I was persuaded, and wrote a letter, which she copied and sent to Lawrence, who expressed himself so much delighted with what he called ‘her playful, pleasant style,’ that I had to write again and again, until now I do it as a matter of course, though it does hurt me sometimes to hear him praise her, and say he never knew she had such a talent for writing.”
“But she will surely undeceive him?” Oliver said, beginning to grow interested in Lilian Veille.
“Oh, she can’t now,” rejoined Mildred, “for she loves him too well, and she says he would not respect her if he knew it.”
“And how will it all end?” asked Oliver, to which Mildred replied:
“End in their being married, of course. He always tells her how much he likes her—how handsome she is, and all that.”
There was the least possible sigh accompanying these words, and Oliver, who heard it, smoothed again the shining braids, as he said, “Milly, Lawrence Thornton told me you were very beautiful, too, with starry eyes and hair the color of rich brown chestnuts.”
“Did he, sure? what else did he say?” and assuming a kneeling position directly in front of Oliver, Mildred buttoned and unbuttoned his linen coat, while he told her everything he could remember of Lawrence Thornton’s remarks concerning herself.
“He likes me because Lilian does, I suppose,” she said, when he had finished. “Did I tell you that his father and Geraldine,—that’s Lilian’s half-sister,—have always intended that he should marry Lilian? She told me so herself, and if she hadn’t, I should have known it from Geraldine, for you know I have been home with Lilian ever so many times, besides spending the long vacation there. I couldn’t bear her,—this Geraldine; she talked so insultingly to me, asking if I hadn’t the least idea who I was, and saying once, right before Lawrence Thornton, that she presumed my mother was some poor, ignorant country girl, who had been unfortunate, and so disposed of me that way! I could have pulled every black hair out of her head!” and Mildred, who, in her excitement loosened a button in Oliver’s coat, looked much like the Mildred of old,—the child who had threatened to set fire to the Judge’s house if he sent her back to Hepsy.