The Three Wishes, by M E B

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. I FIND A FRIEND. The following summer my sister Jane was married to Hugh Vaughan, and went to India, where he had a coffee plantation and where they settled down for the rest of their lives. Our cousin Laura came to be bridesmaid to Jane, and to pay us a long visit after the wedding. I had not thought much about this visit beforehand, for, as Laura was two years older than myself, I took it for granted she would be quite a grown-up young lady, and more a companion for mother than me. But directly I saw my cousin I took an immense fancy to her. She was very pretty, beautiful / thought, and that alone was a great attraction to me. There was an indescribable fascination about her which made her a favourite with every one. At first I was very shy with Laura, and looked upon her as a superior being, one to be admired but notapproached?a bright beautiful creature of another sphere. I watched and listened to her at a respectful distance. It was such a surprise to me, that I could hardly believe it, when I found that Laura seemed to take it as a matter of course that she and I were to be constant companions; and that the attraction was mutual, ?she had taken almost as much fancy to me as I had done to her. Though I was the younger of the two, I was taller, and perhaps looked older; as I had by this time really taken to long dresses and collars and cuffs, which, by-the- by, were a constant source of vexation to me?they would always get inky or crumpled or behave in some improper way. I only studied with the Professor twice a week now, for my mother thought, as Jane was going, it was high time that I left the school-room altogether and began to make myself useful in the house. This was a change I did not at all approve of, for I hated needle-work and al...