"I believe so," was her indifferent answer.
"Have you spoken to her this evening?"
"No, aunt."
"Why?"
"Mary Gardiner and I were never very congenial. We have not been thrown together for some time; and now, I do not care to renew the acquaintance."
I obtained a single glance of the young lady's face. It was proud and haughty in expression, and her eyes had in them a cold glitter that awoke in me a feeling of repulsion.
"I wish you were congenial," the lady said, speaking partly to herself.
"We are not, aunt," was Miss Harvey's reply; and she assumed the air of one who felt herself far superior to another with whom she had been brought into comparison.
"The gems do not correspond, I fear," said I to myself, as I moved to another part of the room. "But who is Miss Gardiner?"
In the next moment, I was introduced to the young lady whose name was in my thought. The face into which I looked was of that fine oval which always pleases the eye, even where the countenance itself does not light up well with the changes of thought. But, in this case, a pair of calm, deep, living eyes, and lips of shape most exquisitely delicate and feminine—giving warrant of a beautiful soul—caused the face of Miss Gardiner to hold the vision as by a spell. Low and very musical was her voice, and there was a discrimination in her words, that lifted whatever she said above the common-place, even though the subjects were of the hour.