A Heart's Bitterness — page 275: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A HEART’S BITTERNESS. 267 fore. The book was Tennyson’s Poems, and Lord Alwood read: , ‘* Cruel, cruel, the words I said, Cruelly came they back to-day. ‘You are too slight and fickle,’ I said, ‘To trouble the heart of Edwin Gray.’ ” All during breakfast Lord Alwood seemed lost in deep meditation. After breakfast he and Violet went tothe — library to look, over papers. When the papers had been examined Lord Alwood spoke, abruptly: ‘You say you mistook Kd liked her; would you mind telling me about it?” , Miss Haviland, and dis- «‘'There is no reason why I should not tell you. I heard | that she had been engaged to Lord Leigh, and I believed he continued to care for her, and I was angry and jealous.” ‘Well, was she not engaged to him?” ay seeNOr ‘*Can you not tell me about it, Lady Leigh? I, too, have heard of this, and perhaps not a true account.” “But, if you were interested, why did you not ask ~ Edna?” . “Ok did. ‘‘What did you ask her? If there had been an engage- ment?” | ‘‘ Why, I asked if he had been her lover.” ‘You see, there is a vast difference,” said Violet, quietly. — ‘¢ Did you ask her to explain?” ‘“No. Iwas jealous and hasty, and asked for a ‘ yes or no,’ and when it was ‘yes,’ I went into a rage.” “«“Then you were very foolish,” said Violet, calmly. Lord Alwood leaned his head on his hand, and sighed. — deeply. Violet remembered how her own life had been — blighted by misunderstandings, and she pitied him. He was, in spite of his admitted hastiness, a good and noble man, and he had had his lesson. She bent forward. | ‘‘Lord Alwood, let me tell you that story. Hdna’s aunt lives by our park gates, and Lord Leigh saw Edna there, when she was scarcely sixteen, and fell in love with her.” Then she told how he had followed her into Cornwall, and succeeded in meeting her, and had seemed much in. — love, had really been enamored, and how Edna had at Eomicbooks.co