"Sincerely yours,
"Wallace Richardson."
Violet was greatly excited by the contents of this letter, and burst into a flood of tears the moment she had perused it.
She understood just how matters stood.
She comprehended how Wallace had grown to love her, even as she had, though at the time unconsciously, learned to love him while she was an invalid in his home; how, with his proud, manly sense of honor, he had determined never to reveal his secret, from a fear that he would be regarded as a fortune-hunter, and that her aristocratic relatives would scorn an alliance with him on account of his poverty.
But Violet felt that he was her peer, if not her superior, in every respect save that of wealth; that a grand future lay before him—grand because he would climb to the top-most round in the ladder of his profession, if energy, perseverance, and unswerving rectitude could attain it.
He might be poor in purse now, but what of that? Money was of little value compared with a nature so rich and noble as his; and, more than that—she loved him!
"Yes, I do!" she exclaimed, as she pressed to her lips the precious letter that told of his love for her. "I am not ashamed of it either, and—I am going to tell him of it."
A crimson flush mounted to her brow as she gave expression to this resolution, and, for a moment, a sense of maidenly reserve and timidity oppressed her. The next she tossed back her pretty head with a resolute air.
"Why should I not tell him?" she said. "Why should I conceal the fact when the knowledge will make two true, loving hearts happy? I have money enough for us both, for the present, and by and by I know he will have an abundance. I suppose Belle and Wilhelm will object and scold, but I don't care; it is the right thing to do, and I am going to do it," and she proceeded to put her resolution at once into action.