"I beg your pardon, Mr. Darrell," she interposed, more gently; "I did

not intend to accuse you of deception. I only meant that, regardless of

any personal feeling, it was, as you said, better to stop this; that to

carry it farther after you had found you did not care for me as you

supposed--or as I was led to suppose----" She paused an instant,

uncertain how to proceed.

"Kathie, Kathie! what are you saying?" Darrell exclaimed. "What have I

said that you should so misunderstand me?"

"But," she protested, piteously, struggling to control her voice, "did

you not say that it was all a mistake on your part--that you wished it

all undone? What else could I understand?"

"My poor child!" said Darrell, tenderly; then reaching over and

possessing himself of one of her hands, he continued, gravely: "The mistake was mine in that I ever allowed myself to think of loving

you when love is not for me. I have no right, Kathie, to love you, or

any other woman, as I am now. I did not know until last night that I did

love you. Then it came upon me like a revelation,--a revelation so

overwhelming that it swept all else before it. You, and you alone,

filled my thoughts. Wherever I was, I saw you, heard you, and you only.

Again and again in imagination I clasped you to my breast, I felt your

kisses on my lips,--just as I afterwards felt them in reality."

He paused a moment and dropped the hand he had taken. Under cover of the

shadows Kate's tears were falling unchecked; one, falling on Darrell's

hand, had warned him that there must be no weakening, no softening.

His voice was almost stern as he resumed. "For those few hours I forgot

that I was a being apart from the rest of the world, exiled to darkness

and oblivion; forgot the obligations to myself and to others which my

own condition imposes upon me. But the dream passed; I awoke to a

realization of what I had done, and whatever I have suffered since is

but the just penalty of my folly. The worst of all is that I have

involved you in needless suffering; I have won your love only to have to

put it aside--to renounce it. But even this is better--far better than

to allow your young life to come one step farther within the clouds

that envelop my own. Do you understand me now, Kathie?"

"Yes," she replied, calmly; "I understand it from your view, as it looks

to you."

"But is not that the only view?"

She did not speak at once, and when she did it was with a peculiar

deliberation.

"The clouds will lift one day; what then?"




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