No bride could have wished anything fairer for her day of days , and Miss Corona dropped back on her pillows with another gentle sigh . `` I 'm so glad that the dear child has a fine day to be married , '' she said . Juliet Gordon was always `` dear child '' to Miss Corona , although the two had never spoken to each other in their lives . Miss Corona was a brisk and early riser as a rule , with a genuine horror of lazy people who lay late abed or took over-long to get their eyes well opened , but this morning she made no hurry about rising , even though scurrying footsteps , banging doors , and over-loud tinkling of dishes in the room below betokened that Charlotta was already up and about . And Charlotta , as poor Miss Corona knew only too well , was fatally sure to do something unfortunate if she were not under some careful , overseeing eye . To be sure , Charlotta 's intentions were always good . But Miss Corona was not thinking about Charlotta this morning , and she felt so strong a distaste for her lonely , purposeless life that she was in no haste to go forth to meet another day of it . Miss Corona felt just the least little bit tired of living , although she feared it was very wicked of her to feel so . She lay there listlessly for half an hour longer , looking through a mist of tears at the portrait of her stern old father hanging on the wall at the foot of the bed , and thinking over the Quarrel . It had happened thirty years ago , when Miss Corona had been a girl of twenty , living alone with her father at the old Gordon homestead on the hill , with the big black spruce grove behind it on the north and far-reaching slopes of green fields before it on the south . Down in the little northern valley below the spruce grove lived her uncle , Alexis Gordon . His son , Meredith , had seemed to Corona as her own brother . The mothers of both were dead ; neither had any other brother or sister . The two children had grown up together , playmates and devoted friends . There had never been any sentiment or lovemaking between them to mar a perfect comradeship . They were only the best of friends , whatever plans the fathers might have cherished for the union of their estates and children , putting the property consideration first , as the Gordons were always prone to do . But , if Roderick and Alexis Gordon had any such plans , all went by the board when they quarreled . Corona shivered yet over the bitterness of that time . The Gordons never did anything half-heartedly . The strife between the two brothers was determined and irreconcilable .
Corona 's XXXXX forbade her to speak to her uncle and cousin or to hold any communication with them .
children distaste father friends girl hurry mothers son uncle union