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“Imagination,” said Katherine, dryly.

“Well, by the imagination then: but it is an imagination that is purified by sentiment, and”–

“Already rendered partial by the innate evidence of worth,” interrupted Charles.

Julia had lost herself in the mazes of her own ideas, and changed the subject under a secret suspicion that her companions were amusing themselves at her expense; she, therefore, proceeded directly to urge the request of Anna Miller.

“Oh! aunt, now we are on the subject of friends, I wish to request you would authorize me to invite my Anna to pass the next winter with us in Park- Place.”

“I confess, my love,” said Miss Emmerson, glancing her eye at Katherine, “that I had different views for ourselves next winter: has not Miss Miller a married sister living in town?”

“Yes, but she has positively refused to ask the dear girl, I know,” said Julia. “Anna is not a favourite with her sister.”

“Very odd that,” said the aunt gravely; “there must be a reason for her dislike then: what can be the cause of this unusual distaste for each other?”

“Oh!” cried Julia, “it is all the fault of Mrs. Welton; they quarrelled about something, I don’t know what, but Anna assures me Mrs. Welton is entirely in fault.”

“Indeed!–and you are perfectly sure that Mrs. Welton is in fault–perhaps Anna has, however, laid too strong a stress upon the error of her sister,” observed the aunt.

“Oh! not at all, dear aunt. I can assure you, on my own knowledge,” continued Julia, “Anna was anxious for a reconciliation, and offered to come and spend the winter with her sister, but Mrs. Welton declared positively that she would not have so selfish a creature round her children: now this Anna told me herself one day, and wept nearly to break her heart at the time.”

“Perhaps Mrs. Welton was right then,” said Miss Emmerson, “and prudence, if not some other reason, justified her refusal.”

“How can you say so, dear aunt?” interrupted Julia, with a little impatience, “when I tell you that Anna herself–my Anna, told me with her own lips, here in this very house, that Mrs. Welton was entirely to blame, and that she had never done any thing in her life to justify the treatment or the remark–now Anna told me this with her own mouth.”

As Julia spoke, the ardour of her feelings brought the colour to her cheeks and an animation to her eyes that rendered her doubly handsome; and Charles Weston, who had watched her varying countenance with delight, sighed as she concluded, and rising, left the room.

“I understand that your father intends spending his winter in Carolina, for his health,” said Miss Emmerson to Katherine.

“Yes,” returned the other in a low tone, and bending over her work to conceal her feelings; “mother has persuaded him to avoid our winter.”

“And you are to be left behind?”

“I am afraid so,” was the modest reply.

“And your brother and sister go to Washington together?”

“That is the arrangement, I believe.”

Miss Emmerson said no more, but she turned an expressive look on her ward, which Julia was too much occupied with her thoughts to notice. The illness of her father, and the prospect of a long separation from her sister, were too much for the fortitude of Katherine at any time, and hastily gathering her work in her hand, she left the room just in time to prevent the tears which streamed down her cheeks from meeting the eyes of her companions.

“We ought to ask Katherine to make one of our family, in the absence of her mother and sister,” said Miss Emmerson, as soon as the door was closed.

“Ah! yes,” cried Julia, fervently, “by all means: poor Katherine, how solitary she would be any where else–I will go this instant and ask her.”

“But–stop a moment, my love; you will remember that we have not room for more than one guest. If Katherine is asked, Miss Miller cannot be invited. Let us look at what we are about, and leave nothing to repent of hereafter.”