CHAPTER IX.
A LONELY HOUSE.
“DO you mean to desert me, Paley?” asked Lilian, sobbing bitterly.
“Does it look as though I meant to desert you when I have nearly ruined myself to provide a house that would please you?” I replied, as gently as I could speak, for I was not angry.
“But you say you will go to that house without me?” she added, looking up as if she had a gleam of hope that I did not mean what I said.
“I did say so, Lilian. I am going at seven o’clock, when the express wagon comes.”
“Don’t you call that deserting me?”
“No, Lilian; it will not be that I desert you, but you desert me.”