moment on the fair, green prospects of the park.

'I hated to listen to father and mother quarrelling, but I loved them, and
I had not been here a year before father died, and darling mother was not
long following him--only six months. Then I had no one: a few distant
relatives, whom I knew nothing of, whom I did not care for, so I gave all
my love to Mr. Burnett. He was so good to me; he never denied me anything;
he gave me everything, even you, dearest Julia. When he thought I wanted a
companion, he found you for me. I learnt to love you. You became my best
and dearest friend. Then things seemed to brighten up, and I thought I was
happy, when all this dreadful trouble came upon us. Don't let's speak of it
more than we can help. I often wished myself dead. Didn't you, Julia?'

Emily Watson told the story of her misfortunes in a low, musical voice,
heedless of two or three interruptions, hardly conscious of her listener,
impressed and interested by the fatality of circumstances which she
believed in design against her. She was a small, slender girl of about
eighteen. Her abundant chestnut hair--exquisite, soft, and silky--was
looped picturesquely, and fastened with a thin tortoiseshell comb. The tiny
mouth trembled, and the large, prominent eyes reflected a strange, yearning
soul. She was dressed in white muslin, and the fantastically small waist
was confined with a white band. Her friend and companion, Julia Bentley,
was a woman of about thirty, well above the medium height, full-bosomed and
small-waisted. The type was Anglo-Saxon even to commonplace. The face was
long, with a look of instinctive kindness upon it. She was given to
staring, and as she looked at Emily, her blue eyes filled with an
expression which told of a nature at once affectionate and intelligent. She
was dressed in yellow linen, and wore a gold bracelet on a well-turned arm.

The room was a long, old-fashioned drawing-room. It had three windows, and