"You have never asked me to kiss you before, Doris."
"Have I not? Perhaps I never may ask you again. Perhaps if I asked you for a kiss this time next year, you would refuse to give it to me."
"No, I should never do that, Doris."
And the two faces—one so brilliantly beautiful, the other so good in its intelligent kindness—touched each other.
Long afterward Mattie remembered that the warm arms had seemed to tighten their clasp round her neck; then Doris drew away, with a little mocking laugh.
"What a sentimental scene!" she said; "the world must be coming to an end."
Mattie wondered a little at her sister's manner, then remembered that she never ought to be surprised, let Doris do what she might.
"Good-night," she repeated as she quitted the room, so little dreaming of all that would pass before she saw that face again.
Then Doris re-read her letters.
"Kindness in this case would only be cruelty," she said to herself. "Better for Earle to know at once. I should prefer sudden death to lingering torture." The beautiful lips curved in a smile that had in it much of pity. "Poor Earle!" she murmured, as she placed the letter written to him on the table. It ran as follows: