"Well, then, I mean to be rich," continued Angila, playfully.
"That's the very nonsense I complain of," said her mother. "It's barely possible, but certainly very improbable, Angila, that you ever should be rich; and considering you have been used to nothing of the kind, it really amuses me to hear you talk so. Your father and I have lived all our lives very comfortably and happily, Angila, without either aviary or conservatory, and I rather think you will do the same, my love."
"Your father and I!" What a falling off was there! for although Angila loved her father and mother dearly, she could not imagine herself intent upon household occupations, an excellent motherly woman some thirty years hence, any more than that her beau ideal should wear pepper and salt like her father.
"It was all very well for papa and mamma," but to persuade a girl of eighteen that she wants no more than her mother, whose heart happens to be like Mrs. Mervale, just then full of a new carpet that Mr. Mervale is hesitating about affording, is out of the question.
And, unreasonable as it may be, whoever would make a young girl more rational, destroys at once the chief charm of her youth—the exuberance of her fresh imagination, that gilds not only the future, but throws a rosy light upon all surrounding objects. Her visions, I grant you, are absurd, but the girl without visions is a clod of the valley, for she is without imagination—and without imagination, what is life? what is love?"
Never fear that her visions will not be fulfilled, and therefore bring disappointment—for the power carries the pleasure with it. The same gift that traces the outline, fills up the sketch. The girls who dream of heroes are those most ready to fall in love with any body—and no woman is so hard to interest as she who never had a vision, and consequently sees men just as they are; and so if Angila talked nonsense, Mrs. Mervale's sense was not much wiser.
Angila was a pretty, playful, romantic girl, rather intolerant of the people she did not like, and enthusiastic about those she did; full of life and animation, she was a decided belle in the gay circle in which she moved.
Miss Lenox was her dearest friend for the time being, and the proposed separation for the next six months was looked upon as a cruel affliction, only to be softened by the most frequent and confidential correspondence.
For the first few weeks of Augusta's absence, the promises exchanged on both sides were vehemently fulfilled. Letters were written two or three limes a week, detailing every minute circumstance that happened to either. But at the end of that time Angila was at a party where she met Robert Hazlewood, who talked to her for some time. It was not a dancing party, and consequently they conversed together more than they had ever done before. He seemed extremely amused with her liveliness, and looked at her with unmistakable admiration. Had Augusta Lenox been there to see, perhaps Angila would not have received his attentions so graciously; but there being nothing to remind her of his being her "favorite aversion," she talked with animation, pleased with the admiration she excited, without being annoyed by any inconvenient reminiscences. And not only was Miss Lenox absent, but Miss Morton was present, and Angila thought she looked over at them a little anxiously; so that a little spirit of rivalry heightened, if not her pleasure, certainly Hazlewood's consequence in her eyes. Girls are often much influenced by each other in these matters—and the absence of Miss Lenox, who "did not think much of Robert Hazlewood," with the presence of Miss Morton who did, had no small influence in Angila's future fate.
"Did you have a pleasant party?" asked Mrs. Mervale, who had not been with her daughter the evening before.