To this, there was no reply, and an embarrassing pause of some
moments ensued.

"May I speak a word with you, brother?"--the young girl at length
said, with a tone and manner that showed her to be compelling
herself to the performance of a painful and repugnant task.

"On what subject, Alice?" the brother asked, looking up with a
doubting expression.

This question brought the colour to Alice's cheeks, and the moisture
to her eyes.

"You know what I would say, John," she at length made out to utter,
in a voice that slightly trembled.

"How should I know, sister?"

"You were not yourself last night, John."

"Alice!"

"Forgive me, brother, for what I now say," the maiden rejoined. "It
is a painful trial, indeed; and were it not that I loved you so
well--were it not that, besides you, there is no one else in the
wide world to whom I can look up, I might shrink from a sister's
duty. But I feel that it would be wrong for me not to whisper in
your ear one warning word--wrong not to try a sister's power over
you."