Paul did come, as she anticipated. The dim, mysterious light did not betray the glowing blush upon her beautiful face, the sparkling, happy light in her eyes. She did not hear his step upon the carpet, nor see him, but some electrical sympathy told her he was approaching.
With a soft, welcoming, trustful smile, she held out her hand, which he took, but omitted to release. Then he sat down close to her, yet slightly behind her chair, as if even now he scarcely dared to believe that the promise of the future could be true.
A murmuring conversation, too low for ears less acute than those attuned by love to hear, and then Paul gently folded Lois in his arms. Then, after a pause, he slipped a diamond ring of betrothal upon her finger, and she was his promised wife.
Vere Gardiner’s dying wishes had come to a happy fruition, after all. And the story ended like the delightful old fairy-tales, with a joyous clash of merry wedding-bells.
But this time there was no rash marrying in haste. Almost a year elapsed, by the influence and desire of Lady Quaintree, before the pretty bridal-party met in Flore Hall, about six weeks before the marriage of Frank Amberley and Blanche Dormer.
The echoes of the harmonious wedding-bells sound as yet through the wedded life of Paul and his true love. Adieu, care; farewell, sorrow, for the inevitable cares and sorrows are shared, so fall lightly.
Sometimes a faint cloud comes over Paul’s face as he thinks of the one act of folly which had so nearly ruined his life; but he tries to forget the forbidding past, and to sun himself in the love and bright smiles of his wife and two little angel-children, baby Lois, and her elder brother, Paul.
THE END.
“Her Heart’s Delight,” by Bertha M. Clay is the title of No. 301 of the New Bertha Clay Library. It is a story that the readers of this series will not find lacking in the skill that Bertha Clay displays in telling a vivid romance.
POPULAR COPYRIGHTS