a letter, that I have come to remove you from her kind sheltering
care, as your mother wishes you for a while at least to be placed in
a different position, and I have promised to carry out her
instructions. Here is her letter. Shall I read it to you, or are you
sufficiently advanced to be able to spell it out without my
assistance?"

He held up the letter, and she looked at him proudly, with a faint
curl in her dainty lip, and a sudden lifting of her lovely arched
eyebrows, which, without the aid of verbal protest, he fully
comprehended. A smile hovered about his mouth, and disclosed a set of
glittering perfect teeth, but he silently resumed his seat. As Regina
broke the seal, Mother said:

"Wait, dear, and read it later. Mr. Palmer has already been detained
some time, and says he is anxious to catch the train. Run up to the
wardrobe, and Sister Helena will change your dress. She is packing
your clothes."

When the door closed behind her a heavy sigh floated through the
grating, and the sweet seraphic face of the nun clouded.

"I wish we could keep her always; it is a sadly solemn thing to cast
such a child as she is into the world's whirlpool of sin and sorrow.
To-day she is as spotless in soul as one of our consecrated
annunciation lilies; but the dust of vanity and selfishness will
tarnish, and the shock of adversity will bruise, and the heat of the
battle of life that rages so fiercely in the glare of the outside
world will wither and deface the sweet blossom we have nurtured so
carefully."