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Rh nounced Mademoiselle Moore; “consequently, I feel assured that my brother will not return till then: indeed, I should be sorry if he did. We will have coffee: it would be vain to wait for him.”

“I am tired—may I leave my work now, cousin?”

“You may, since it grows too dark to see to do it well. Fold it up; put it carefully in your bag; then step into the kitchen, and desire Sarah to bring in the goûter, or tea, as you call it.”

“But it has not yet struck six: he may still come.”

“He will not, I tell you. I can calculate his movements. I understand my brother.”

Suspense is irksome, disappointment bitter. All the world has, some time or other, felt that. Caroline, obedient to orders, passed into the kitchen. Sarah was making a a dress for herself at the table.

“You are to bring in coffee,” said the young lady, in a spiritless tone; and then she leaned her arm and head against the kitchen mantelpiece, and hung listlessly over the fire.

“How low you seem, Miss! But it’s all because your cousin keeps you so close to work. It's a shame!”

“Nothing of the kind, Sarah,” was the brief reply.

“Oh! but I know it is. You’re fit to cry just this minute, for nothing else but because you’ve sat still the whole day. It would make a kitten dull to be mewed up so.” I 2