Lucy Harding by Mary Jane Holmes

Three years later I was again in Europe, traveling with my nephew and niece, Katy and Jack, the motherless children of my only sister. We had seen a great deal, for the young people were full of life and health, and eager to see everything-not once, but twice and sometimes three times. I was getting tired and glad of a rest in Paris, where at the Bellevue I was taking my breakfast one morning in our salon, while Katy and Jack were looking up some route presumably to Italy, our next objective point. They were evidently greatly interested and even excited, but were talking so low that I could not catch a word, as I sat and watched them with feelings of pride and half envy of their youth and spirits which could enjoy everything and endure everything.

Katy was a beautiful girl of eighteen, with large blue eyes and a sweet, flower-like face, and hair something the shade mine had been when young, but much darker, with glints of reddish gold showing on it in the sunlight. I was very proud of Katy and of her brother Jack, with his frank, handsome face and a manliness about him one would hardly expect in a lad of fifteen. He had constituted himself the leader of our party and usually had the best route and trains and hotels picked out, and I felt sure the subject of their discussion now was the journey to Italy. It was the last of November and the wind was blowing cold and raw through the boulevards, and the basket of wood Louis brought us gave but little heat.