Laura’s face burned indignantly; she hardly let me finish before she exclaimed,—­

“Susan Lee!  I am ashamed of you!  Here are you, an old maid, as happy as anybody, decrying all good gifts to a woman, except beauty, because, indeed, they stand in the way of her marriage! as if a woman was only made to be a housekeeper!”

Laura’s indignation amused me.  I went on.

“Yes, I am happy enough; but I should have been much happier, had I married.  Don’t waste your indignation, dear; you are pretty enough to excuse your being sensible, and you ought to agree with my ideas, because they excuse Frank, and yours do not.”

“I don’t want to excuse him; I am really angry about it.  I can’t bear to have Frank throw himself away; she is pretty now, but what will she be in ten years?”

“People in love do not usually enter into such remote calculations; love is to-day’s delirium; it has an element of divine faith in it, in not caring for the morrow.  But, Laura, we can’t help this matter, and we have neither of us any conscience involved in it.  Miss Bowen may be better than we know.  At any rate, Frank is happy, and that ought to satisfy both you and me just now.”

Laura’s eyes filled with tears.  I could see them glisten on the dark lashes, as she affected to tie her hat, all the time untying it as fast as ever the knot slid.  She was a sympathetic little creature, and loved Frank very sincerely, having known him as long as she could remember.  She gave me a silent kiss, and went away, leaving the letter, yet unopened, lying in my lap.  I did not open it just then.  I was thinking of Josephine Bowen.

Every summer, for three years, Mr. and Mrs. Bowen had come to Ridgefield for country-air, bringing with them their adopted daughter, whose baptismal name had resigned in favor of the pet appellation “Kitten,”—­a name better adapted to her nature and aspect than the Imperatrice appellation that belonged to her.  She was certainly as charming a little creature as ever one saw in flesh and blood.  Her sweet child’s face, her dimpled, fair cheeks, her rose-bud of a mouth, and great, wistful, blue eyes, that laughed like flax-flowers in a south-wind, her tiny, round chin, and low, white forehead, were all adorned by profuse rings and coils and curls of true gold-yellow, that never would grow long, or be braided, or stay smooth, or do anything but ripple and twine and push their shining tendrils out of every bonnet or hat or hood the little creature wore, like a stray parcel of sunbeams that would shine.  Her delicate, tiny figure was as round as a child’s,—­her funny hands as quaint as some fat baby’s, with short fingers and dimpled knuckles.  She was a creature as much made to be petted as a King-Charles spaniel,—­and petted she was, far beyond any possibility of a crumpled rose-leaf.  Mrs. Bowen was fat, loving, rather foolish, but the best of friends and the poorest of enemies; she wanted