he could recover from such a tremendous blow so soon. He carefully stirred up the embers of his lost love, but they refused to burst into a blaze: there was only a comfortable glow that warmed and did him good without putting him into a fever, and he was reluctantly obliged to confess that the boyish passion was slowly subsiding into a more tranquil sentiment, very tender, a little sad and resentful still, but that was sure to pass away in time, leaving a brotherly affection which would last unbroken to the end.
As the word “brotherly” passed through his mind in one of these reveries, he smiled, and glanced up at the picture of Mozart that was before him:—
“Well, he was a great man; and when he couldn’t have one sister he took the other, and was happy.”
Laurie did not utter the words, but he thought them; and the next instant kissed the little old ring, saying to himself—
“No, I won’t! I haven’t forgotten, I never can. I’ll try again, and if that fails, why, then—”