She did not cry; she very seldom did: but she clasped her hands
tightly together, and looked so white and wild, that Karl came to
her, and, taking her in his arms, would have soothed and caressed
her like a little child, had not she repulsed him.

"Please not, dear Karl! I must bear my griefs alone for I am alone
in all the world."

It was the bitterest sentence Dora had ever spoken, and her cousin
looked at her in dismay.

"If Picter could have given the disease to me instead of to aunt,
and he and I could have journeyed on together into another world as
we had through this, and left your mother to Kitty and you!"
continued Dora; while in her eyes, and about her white lips,
quivered a passion of grief far beyond any tears,--far beyond, thank
God! any grief that eyes and lips so young are often called to
express. And as it rose and swelled in her girl heart, and shook her
strong young soul, Dora uttered in one word all the bitterness of
her orphaned life.

"Mother!" cried she, and clinched her hands above the sharp pain
that seemed to suffocate her, the pain we call heart-ache, and might
sometimes more justly call heart-break.

Karl looked at her, and his gay young face grew strong, and full of
meaning. He folded her again in his arms, and said,--

"Dora, I had not meant to speak yet; but I cannot see you so, or