w friends had joined the Wavertree family circle that evening, and
Reine had no further opportunity of speaking about Hetty. She was absent
and thoughtful; but wakened up when asked to sing, and sang a thrilling
little love song with such power and sweetness as went to everybody's
heart. She was thinking as she sang of Hetty's face, and it was her
strange yearning for Hetty's love that inspired her to sing as she did.

That night she could not sleep. Her mother's eyes, with the loving look
she remembered so well, were gazing at her from all the corners of the
room. Her mind went back over the recollections of her childhood; and
her father's voice and her mother's smiles were with her as though she
had only said good-night to both parents an hour ago. The lonely girl,
who had everything that the world could offer her, except that which she
longed for most, the affection of family and kindred, felt the very
depths of her heart shaken by the experience of the past evening. That a
girl who seemed so much a part of herself should have risen up beside
her, and yet be nothing to her, seemed something too curious to be
understood. Her imagination went to work upon the possibilities of Mr.
Enderby's being induced to give Hetty up to her altogether, to be her
adopted sister and to live with her for evermore. She was aware that
people would distrust this sudden fancy for a stranger, and that
opposition would probably be offered to her plan; but then she was not
her own mistress; and by perseverance she must surely succeed in the
end.

Oh, the delight of having a sister! Reine had had a sister, a baby
sister lost in infancy, and had often taken a sad pleasure in fancying
what that sister might have been like if she had lived. She had been six
years younger than Reine. Hetty was fifteen, about the age that the
little sister might now have been. Reine sat up in her bed and counted
the years between fifteen and twenty-one twice over on her fingers to
make perfectly sure. Hetty was the very age of the little sister. And so
like her mother! If the baby sister of whom she had been bereft could be
still alive, then Reine would have declared she must be Hetty.

She was now in a fever of excitement. Her curly brown hair had risen in
a mop of rings and ringlets around her head with tossing on her pillow,
her eyes were round and bright, and a burning spot was on each of her
cheeks. At last she sprang out of bed and in a minute was at Nell's