"Oh, yes," said Pauline.

She turned round almost cheerfully. A cloud seemed to vanish from her
face.

"I am so glad you have come, Renny," she said. "I see so little of you
lately. Get up on the bed, won't you, and lie near me?"

"Of course I love to be with you, but I thought----"

"Oh! don't think anything," said Pauline. "Just get on the bed and cuddle
up close, close to me. And let us imagine that we are back in the old
happy days before Aunt Sophy came."

Verena did not say anything. She got on the bed, flung her arms round
Pauline's neck, and strained her sister to her heart.

"I love you so much!" she said.

"Do you, Renny? That is very, very sweet of you."

"And you love me, don't you, Paulie?"

"I--I don't know."

"Pauline! You don't know? You don't know if you love me or not?"

"I don't think that I love anybody, Renny."

"Oh, Paulie! then there must be something dreadfully bad the matter with
you."

Pauline buried her face in Verena's soft white neck and lay quiet.

"Does your head ache very badly, Paulie?"

"Pretty badly; but it is not too bad for us to talk--that is, if you will
keep off the unpleasant subjects."

"But what unpleasant subjects can there be? I don't understand you,
Paulie. I cannot think of anything specially unpleasant to talk of now."

"You are a bit of a goose, you know," replied Pauline with a smile.

"Am I? I didn't know it. But what are the subjects we are not to talk
about?"

"Oh, you must know! Aunt Sophia, for instance, and that awful time at
Easterhaze, and the most terrible of all terrible days when I went to the
White Bay, and Nancy King, and--and my birthday. I can't talk of these
subjects. I will talk of anything else--of baby Marjorie, and how pretty
she grows; how fond we are of nurse, and of father, and--oh!"

Pauline burst into a little laugh.

"Do you know that John is courting Betty? I know he is. He went up to her
the other day in the garden and put his hand on her shoulder, and when he
thought no one was by he kissed her. I hid behind the hedge, and I had
the greatest difficulty to keep back a shout of merriment. Isn't it fun?"

"I suppose so," said Verena. "But, Pauline, what you say makes me
unhappy. I wish I might talk out to you."

Pauline raised herself on her elbow and looked full into Verena's face.

"What about?" she asked.

Verena did not speak for a minute.

"Where are your dresses?" she asked suddenly.

"My dresses! You sil