But she might have unexpected wants—sickness, accident, charity?
"If so," she said trustfully, "would not her boy come back?"
He had just time to buy his ticket and gain the platform. He folded her in his arms, and exchanged one long, sobbing kiss. It seemed to Ralph Flare that the sound of that kiss was like a spell—the breaking of the pleasantest link in his life—the passing from sinfulness to a baser selfishness—the stamp and seal upon his bargain with ambition, whereby for the long future he was sold to the sorrow of avarice and the deceitfulness of fame.
There was a sharp whistle from the locomotive—who invented that whistle to pierce so many bosoms at parting?—the cars moved one by one till the last, in which he was seated, sprang forward with a jerk; and though she was quite blind, he saw her handkerchief waving till all had vanished, and he would have given the world to have shed one tear.
He has gone on into the free country, and to-night he will sleep under the shadow of the mountains.
She has turned back into the dark city, and she will not sleep at all in her far-up chamber.
It is only one heart crushed, and thousands that deserve more sympathy beat out every day. We only notice this one because it shall lie bleeding, and get no sympathy at all.