Earle Wayne's nobility

by Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

His heart was full of bitterness, for since Mr. Forrester’s death he had not seen a single friendly face or received one word of kindly remembrance from any one.

He could not forget Editha’s long neglect of him—the long, weary months, during which she had promised to send him some token, and none had come.

She had other cares and pleasures; her time was probably occupied by her fashionable friends and acquaintances, and it could not be expected that she would give much thought to a miserable convict; doubtless she would not have remembered him now had it not been a duty she owed to the wishes of her uncle, he reasoned, with a dreary pain in his heart.

Editha was, he knew, nearly or quite twenty now; she had already been in society nearly two years, and, perchance, she had already given her heart to some worthy, fortunate man, who could place her in a position befitting her beauty and culture; and what business had he, who would henceforth be a marked man—a pariah among men—to imagine that she would think of him except, perhaps, with a passing feeling of pity?

But even though he reasoned thus with himself, and tried to school his mind to think that he must never presume to believe that Editha could cherish anything of regard for him, even though she had signed herself “ever your friend,” yet he experienced a dull feeling of despair creeping over him, and even the prospect of his approaching liberation could not cheer him.

He had a little box in which he treasured some dried and faded flowers—the last he had received from her—and he looked at these occasionally with a mournful smile and a swelling tenderness in his heart, and his eyes grew misty with unshed tears as he remembered the sweet-faced, impulsive girl who had so generously stood up and defended him in that crowded court-room.

He remembered how she had grieved over her own reluctantly given evidence, which had gone so far toward convicting him—how she had laid her hot cheek upon his hand and sobbed out her plea for forgiveness, and her look of firm faith and trust in him when she had told him that he did not need to prove his innocence to her, she would take his word in the face of the whole world.

A strange thrill always went through him as he thought of the burning tears she had shed for him and his sad fate, and which had rained upon the hand which she had held clasped in both of hers.

It was a sort of sad pleasure to look back upon all this, and think how kind she had been, and in his own heart he knew that he loved her as he could never love another; but he had no right to think of her in that way. If she had only remembered him occasionally, it would not be quite so hard to bear; but she had not kept her promise—she had forgotten him in spite of her eager protestations that she would not.

He would gladly have gone away from the city as soon as he should be liberated, and thus avoid the pain of meeting and parting with her, but she had written and requested it, and he must have his package again, while he would treasure any message which his kind friend, Richard Forrester, had left for him.