Wingrave
took no note of these things. Once more he seemed to see coming up the
path the little black-frocked child, with the pale face and the great
sad eyes; it was she indeed who rose so swiftly from the hidden seat.
Then Wingrave stopped short for he felt stirring within him all the
long repressed madness of his unlived manhood. It was the weakness
against which he had fought so long and so wearily, triumphant now, so
that his heart beat like a boy's, and the color flamed into his
cheeks. And all the time she was coming nearer, and he saw that the
child had become a woman, and it seemed to him that all the joy of
life was alight in her face, and the one mysterious and wonderful
secret of her sex was shining softly out of her eager eyes. So that,
after all, when they met, Wingrave asked her no questions. She came
into his arms with all the graceful and perfect naturalness of a child
who has wandered a little away from home . . . .
"I am too old for you, dear," he said presently, as they wandered
about the garden, "much too old."
"Age," she answered softly, "what is that? What have we to do with the
years that are past? It is the years to come only which we need
consider, and to think of them makes me almost tremble with happiness.
You are much too rich and too wonderful a personage for a homeless
orphan like me; but," she added, tucking her arm through his with a
contented little sigh, "I have you, and I shall not let you go!"
End of Project Gutenberg Etext The Malefactor, by E.
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