The unsteady writing fades and is gone. Your eyes through a mist of tears see a young, ardent, boyish face, you see eyes that plead and are filled with a hope that fights valiantly against despair. Those hastily scrawled, passionate words are as voices that come to you out of the past, voices that remind you of how he loved you once—when you were but eighteen!
There came from the little clock on, the mantel a whirring sound, then it struck One—Two—She lifted her head for a moment, there was a step on the stairs outside, her father come home from the Club, he passed her door.
A mist was before her eyes, the letters were all blurred and indistinct, the writing—she could no longer see, yet, she knew every word written there. How many times had she read them over and over and yet over again!
And what need to read them when, she knew them so well? Would she ever forget them? So many pages, so closely written and yet all that had been said, could have been said in but three words, three short words, "I love you!"
So she sat there with the letters all in a heap in her lap, and her head bowed.
Memory—Memory was monarch of all to-night. Memory ruled and reigned supreme.
That night, do you remember, Kathleen? The night when the raindrops pattered on the glossy leaves of the magnolia that grew beneath your window? Do you remember how he stood there looking up at you, the light from your lamp on his face? Do you remember? And that day, the day you met him by the end of the lane and put your hand in his and went with him down the long road? Do you remember? And then again——
She moved suddenly, she flung her head back, her face was white and drawn and there was agony in her eyes. She rose suddenly and thrust the letters into the empty grate, she bent over them and struck a match and watched them burn.
And then, when the last was turned to grey and black ash, she went back to the table and took up the great expensive, glittering ring, the ring that represented more money than He had ever owned. And so she turned it over and over between her white fingers and laughed suddenly. But the laughter was not good to hear.
CHAPTER IX