CHAPTER I.

The wooded banks of Richmond were in all the soft green of early spring, when they were first seen by Leila. A few months had passed; the trees were now half stripped of their leaves, and the autumn tints were fast fading into sombre gray as she a second time caught sight of its wooded heights; but how different were now her feelings, how much more beautiful did the whole scene appear to her with Selina by her side! Selina was spring, summer, sunshine, and all to Leila, and she had not a sigh to give to the falling leaves or the moaning wind.

As the carriage drew up before the same low, picturesque-looking house, which she had before visited, Matilda and Alfred (who with their papa and mamma had preceded them but a few minutes) stood holding the house-door open, ready to give them welcome. Little Alfred bustled out to assist in letting down the steps, and Matilda, in her eagerness to help them to alight, had well nigh brought them to the ground.

“Softly, softly,” Mr. Howard exclaimed, as he endeavoured to catch hold of Leila’s frock; but Matilda had succeeded in extricating both the little girls from the carriage.

“Oh, what a day of joy!” she cried; “Cousin Leila still to be with us for a whole month, and Selina as able to talk to her now as I am; Selina, do you remember when you went away?”

Selina did remember: she coloured, her eyes filled with tears, and throwing her arms first round her sister’s neck, and then round Leila’s, she darted from their side.

“Why does she do that? where has she gone?” Leila anxiously inquired.

“I think I know,” Matilda answered; and pointing to a door on the opposite side of the passage, she flew back to the carriage to assist in getting out the parcels.

Leila crossed the passage, and softly opened the door; Selina was on her knees by the side of her little bed; she timidly advanced, and lifting the white muslin curtain which partly concealed Selina’s slight figure, she knelt by her side. As the two little girls rose from their knees, their eyes met eyes so full of gratitude to heaven, as almost made Selina’s half-whispered explanation, “Leila, I could not wait till night, unnecessary;” “and now,” she continued, “I must go to dear mamma.”

When Selina returned soon after, she found Leila and Matilda, assisted by Amy, arranging the smaller parcels, and carrying them to the different rooms. Matilda looked eagerly in Selina’s eyes.

“I see what you have been doing,” she said, reproachfully: “but I think it is I that should cry: when we were here before, I had to speak both for you and myself. Oh, it was so nice; no, no, Selina, I don’t mean that, I don’t indeed; I am so glad you can speak, oh, so very glad; I said it only to make you laugh, and now I am near crying myself, but I won’t; this is not a day to weep, the very happiest day of all our lives. Come, let us go and visit the school-room; not to say lessons, you know, but just to enjoy ourselves.”

“Yes, that will be an excellent plan,” Leila answered; “and perhaps in the bread-basket we shall still find the head of the doll, which would have been so pretty a doll for my Sally, if it had not been so hardly dealt with.”

Matilda laughed; “How funny you are,” she said, turning to Leila, and passing her arm round her waist; “you have put away my sorrow in a minute.”

The three little girls proceeded to the school-room.

“How very nice it looks!” Leila exclaimed; “how bright, how cheerful-looking; so different from what it was before.”

“And were you very melancholy when you were here before, and did not find us?” Matilda inquired.

“Oh, so melancholy when I saw the flowerpots,” Leila answered; “and I cried so when I saw the paper with ‘Custom commonly makes things easy.’ Yes, ‘Custom commonly’ was the worst of all.”

“But that is all over now,” Matilda observed; “so we need not speak about it, for now we are all three as happy as can be; don’t you think so, Selina?”

“Indeed I do, Matilda; but it is such a deep joy I cannot find words to utter it; it does not make me merry, but do not think it is because I am sad. If you are happy and think it a joyful day, what must it be to me? I had given up all hope of ever being able to speak again; I was telling Leila so that very day, and making her promise not to pray for it any more. Then so many changes have come upon me. When I saw Leila on the ground, when I thought her dead,--oh, I must not think of it; and when she opened her eyes again, and said, ‘Who spoke? what has happened?’ and when she knew God had opened my lips, what a moment that was! Leila’s joy, and my joy too, and to be able to tell her how much I loved her. You do not know how I used to struggle before, and what it was for me not to be able to speak.”

“Indeed I do know very well,” Matilda answered; “for when mamma often says to me, ‘Matilda, I must beg you to be silent, you distract my head,’ I am more anxious to speak than ever; and so vexed, I would rather she had given me a good slap.”

“A good _slap_!” Leila exclaimed. “Oh, Matilda, if my papa were ever to slap me, I would--” she covered her face with her hands and shuddered.

“What would you do?” Matilda anxiously inquired, as she pulled down Leila’s hands, and tried to get a sight of her face.

“I would die,” Leila answered, in a voice so low that the words were scarcely audible.

But Matilda caught them. “Oh dear,” she cried, “how I have shocked you; what a shocked face you have; well, I am always saying something wrong, and I dare say I shall never be better; for these kind of things come out before I know what I am saying. Selina, do you think it was so very wrong, and was Leila right to say she would----? You know what I mean. You always tell me we should take trials patiently.”

Selina coloured. “I think you were both a little wrong,” she said, timidly. “You were wrong to talk in that way of dear mamma, who is always so patient and gentle with you; and very wrong to say you would never be better, when you know God will give you strength if you pray for it with all your heart; but not if you say wandering prayers, and do not really wish it;” and she looked anxiously at Matilda.

“And cousin Leila?” Matilda inquired.

Selina proceeded. “Yes; Leila I thought was a little wrong to express herself so strongly; you know Uncle Howard always says she must try to command her feelings more,--you are not angry with me, Leila, for saying this?”

“Angry? Oh! no, no. I love you even more when you tell me I have not done right; for I feel that you are so true, and you say it so gently, just as my papa does.”

“Well to be sure!” Matilda said; “to _like_ to be told that one is not good, I can never get up to that; I don’t like at all to be told I am not good; I would rather say it of myself than that others should say it; indeed, it comforts me sometimes to say it all out. Selina, do you know that at this very moment I am not good?”

“Yes, I do know,--you were glad when I said Leila had been wrong too.”

“And is that all?” Matilda inquired.

“No, not quite all; you were disappointed when you found it was so small a fault.”

“Oh, Selina! it is too bad in you to say that; you are glad when you find people are good, and like yourself, and I cannot help being rather glad also, when I find people a little like myself, though I am not good; but you are getting into a way of seeing me through and through; you must not do that, or you will see a great many things to frighten you; at least, please don’t begin to-day, when we were to have been so merry; but do you know what I think is going to happen; something that won’t make us merry at all,--and yet I shall be so curious to see her.”

“See _whom_?” both the others exclaimed; “what do you mean, Matilda?”

“I mean that we are going to get a governess; that is, that I think, perhaps, we are to get one.”

“And why do you think so?” Selina asked.

“Because when I went into the drawing-room with one of the parcels, (mamma’s blotting-book, you know,) I heard Uncle Howard say, ‘Yes, I certainly do see the advantage of having a governess; _but_----’ and then I put down the parcel very slowly, that I might hear more; but mamma said, ‘Matilda, don’t linger in the room, for we are engaged at present, and wish to be alone.’ So, you know, I was obliged to be off very quick; do you think you will like it Selina?--to be sure, it won’t be so bad for you, but it will be bad enough for poor me, with all my scrapes; and yet I should like to see what sort of a face she has got, though I am quite sure I shall not like it.”

“But perhaps the governess is for _me_,” Leila said, in a sorrowful tone; then added, “and I shall never be alone with my papa any more.”

“No, no,” Matilda eagerly exclaimed; “don’t vex yourself, Leila. Don’t put on that sorrowful face; I am sure the governess is for us; for once before I heard mamma say something about it to papa,--it was one day when she said I was unmanageable, and you know you are never unmanageable.”

“If you mean that I never am very bad, you are mistaken; you don’t know all the things I do sometimes, and wish to do.”

“Well, well,” Matilda answered, “don’t tell me about them, for I don’t want to hear; it is too bad that to-day, when we have no lessons, and are so happy to be home again, we do nothing but speak about faults, and make each other melancholy. See, the sun is out--it is quite fair now--let us go into the garden and have a nice race.”

Leila’s face brightened. “It will be delightful,” she said, as they all three ran off together.