This inexhaustible freshness of physical organization seemed to
open the windows of her soul, and make for her a new heaven and
earth every day. It gave also a peculiar and almost
embarrassing directness to her mental processes, and suggested
in them a sort of final and absolute value, as if truth had for
the first time found a perfectly translucent medium. It was
not so much that she said rare things, but her very silence was
eloquent, and there was a great deal of it. Her girlhood had in
it a certain dignity as of a virgin priestess or sibyl. Yet
her hearty sympathies and her healthy energy made her at home
in daily life, and in a democratic society. To Kate, for
instance, she was a necessity of existence, like light or air.
Kate's nature was limited; part of her graceful equipoise was
narrowness. Hope was capable of far more self-abandonment to a
controlling emotion, and, if she ever erred, would err more
widely, for it would be because the whole power of her
conscience was misdirected. "Once let her take wrong for
right," said Aunt Jane, "and stop her if you can; these born
saints give a great deal more trouble than children of this
world, like my Kate." Yet in daily life Hope yielded to her
cousin nine times out of ten; but the tenth time was the key to
the situation. Hope loved Kate devotedly; but Kate believed in
her as the hunted fugitive believes in the north star.

To these maidens, thus united, came Emilia home from Europe.
The father of Harry and Hope had been lured into a second
marriage with Emilia's mother, a charming and unscrupulous
woman, born with an American body and a French soul. She
having once won him to Paris, held him there life-long, and
kept her step-children at a safe distance. She arranged that,