"What is the matter, Amy dear?" asked Isabel, taking the trembling child in her arms. But Amy could not speak; she only clung to Isabel, and sobbed more bitterly than before. Isabel sat down with Amy on her knee, stroking the shining hair until the child should be more composed. After a time, when the violence of her grief had a little abated, Isabel kissed her and inquired the cause of her tears.
"Rose says that you are going to Madagascar with Everard, and perhaps I shall never see you any more," she managed to blurt out amid her sobs. "You ought not to go, for I am sure I love you more than he does. I told him so this morning, but he only laughed and said I didn't; but I do, and I think it is very unkind of him to take you away. We know lots of young ladies; I'm sure he might marry some one else, and not take my darling Isabel to nasty Madagascar. Oh, Isabel, you must not go. Oh, please! please!" she said, coaxingly. "Oh, won't you please tell him that you have changed your mind, and would rather stay with us?"
"Oh, but you know I promised, Amy."
"But you shan't go; tell him you won't; there's a dear, kind pet," and she threw her arms round Isabel's neck.
"But don't you think that it is very selfish of little Amy to wish that her brother should go alone to that far country, when she will have papa, mamma, and sisters?"
"Oh! I wish you didn't love him one bit, and then you would stay with us."
"Hush! Amy dear, you mustn't talk so."
"But I can't help wishing it, and I told Everard so, and that I hoped you would change your mind. Then he said that it was very wicked of me to wish that; and he put me off his knee so quick, and walked out of the room looking so angry—no, not angry, exactly, but as if he thought, perhaps, you might."
"But, Amy, if you loved any one very much, would you like it if that person didn't love you one bit?"
"No," said Amy, thoughtfully.