“I have never known any other than such a home as that,” said Houston, slowly, “and it is the only true home.”
“Pardon me,” said Miss Gladden, “but are your parents living? I have often wondered.”
“No,” he replied, “my parents died when I was a mere child, but the faint recollection of my early home, and the memory of my uncle’s home, which has been mine also, correspond very closely with the picture you have just drawn.”
“Then with you it is a reality,” she answered, “but with me, only an ideal.”
“Miss Gladden,” said Houston very earnestly, but with great tenderness, “will you not let me help you to make a reality of your ideal?” Then, as she did not immediately reply, he continued, “The love that we believe in as the foundation of a true home, is not lacking on my part. I love you, Leslie, so much that life with you anywhere would seem perfect and complete, while life without you, even in a palace, would not seem worth the living. Can you love me enough to share my life and home, whatever it may be, as my wife?”
He had taken her hand, and she did not withdraw it, but looking in his face, she asked:
“Would you make me your wife, knowing so little of me as you do?”
“I think I know enough,” he replied, “I know that you are a pure, true-hearted woman; I know that whether you love me or not,” her eyes dropped, “there is no one you love better than me; and though I do not know it, I am almost sure that you do care for me in some degree, am I not right?”
She looked up into the face bending over her, and Houston read his answer in her eyes, and even had she tried to speak, he gave her no opportunity for doing so.
“To think of your conceit!” exclaimed Miss Gladden, a few moments later, “in having the assurance to say that I cared for no one more than you, whether I loved you or not; how did you ever come to make such an assertion?”