Quill's Window

by George Barr McCutcheon

Very distinctly now came the words, almost in a wail:

"Oh, Courtney, why—why do you lie to me?"

"Lie to you? My dear girl, do you know what you are—"

A low moan, and a harsh, choking sob smote his ear, and then the click of the receiver on the hook.

"Well, I'll be hanged!" he muttered angrily. "That's the last time I'll call you up, take it from me."

And it was the last time he ever called her up.

Then he, too, ravaged by uneasy thoughts, struck off into the country lanes, the better to commune with himself. In due course, he came to the gate leading up to the top of Quill's Window. Here he lagged. His gaze went across the strip of pasture-land to the deserted house above the main-travelled road. He started. His gaze grew more intense. A lone figure traversed the highway. It turned in at the gate, and, as he watched, strode swiftly up the path to the front door....He saw her bend over, evidently to insert a key in the lock. Then the door opened and closed behind her.

III — Every word of David's letter was impressed on Alix's brain. Over and over again she repeated to herself certain passages as she strode rapidly through the winding lanes. She spoke them tenderly, wonderingly, and her eyes were shining.

DEAREST ALIX:

I have always loved you. I want you to know it. There has never been an hour in all these years that I have not thought of you, that your dear face has not been before me. In France, here, everywhere,—always I am looking into your eyes, always I am hearing your voice, always I am feeling the gentle touch of your hand. Now you know. I could not have told you before. I am the blacksmith's son. God knows I am not ashamed of that. But I cannot forget, nor can you, that a blacksmith's son lies buried at the top of that grim old hill, and that he was not good enough for the daughter of a Windom. I hear that you have given your heart to some one else. You will marry him. But to the end of your days,—and I hope they may be many,—I want you to know that there is one man who will love you with all his heart and all his soul to the end of HIS days. I hope you will be happy. It is my greatest, my only wish. Once upon a time, we stole away, you and I, to write romances of love and adventure. Even then, you were my heroine. I was putting you into my poor story, but you were putting your dreams into yours, and I was not your dream hero. Then we would read to each, other what we had written. Do you remember how guardedly we read and how stealthy we were so as not to arouse suspicion or attract attention to our lair? I shall never forget those happy hours. Every line I wrote and read to you, Alix dear, was of you and FOR you. You were my heroine. My hero, feeble creature, told you how much I loved you, and you never suspected.