I tell you
now to reassure you. I love her."
Aaron King made his declaration to his two friends with a simple dignity,
but with a feeling that thrilled them with the force of his earnestness
and the purity and strength of his passion.
Conrad Lagrange--world-worn, scarred by his years of contact with the
unclean, the vicious, and debasing passions of mankind--grasped the young
man's hand, while his eyes shone with an emotion his habitual reserve
could not conceal. "I'm glad for you, Aaron"--he said, adding
reverently--"as your mother would be glad."
"I have known that you would tell me this, sometime Mr. King," said Myra
Willard. "I knew it, I think, before you, yourself, realized; and I, too,
am glad--glad for my girl, because I know what such a love will mean to
her. But why--why has she gone like this? Where has she gone? Oh, my girl,
my girl!" For a moment, the distracted woman was on the point of breaking
down; but with an effort of her will, she controlled herself.
"It's clear enough what has sent her away," growled Conrad Lagrange, with
a warning glance to the artist. "Some one has filled her mind with the
notion that her friendship with Aaron has been causing talk.
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