A Struggle for a Ring — page 311: what you’re looking at

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

THE HUSBAND’S PROMISE. 307 ice that fills my veins? Am I human, that you think I can see you, hear you, live near you, love you, and not long for one word of love in return?” ‘‘I have not thought about it,” he said. ‘‘As I tell you, it has never seemed to me a matter of love.” She laid her hand on his. ‘* Do try to care a little for me,” she said. ‘‘I am your wife—I bear your name—I love you—give me a thought sometimes. ” She bent down and kissed the hand she held out in her own. He started at the touch of those warm, trembling lips. Snail? ‘‘T am only young,” she said, ‘‘and I cannot help loving you. Ido not think that in all the world there is any one like you—I have seen no one.” He smiled at the unconscious flattery. of. her words. ‘‘T cannot help loving you,” she repeated. ‘‘ When you enter a room, I always say to myself there is no one here like him—and yet—he is mine—I am his wife— though he talks and laughs with others, I am his wife.” ‘* Poor child!” he said, gently. ‘‘And then—you will laugh at me perhaps, but I can- not help it—then the careless words people say stab me to the heart.” ‘« What words are those, Ailie?” he asked. Even in the faint light of the stars he saw the hot flush that covered her face. She paused for a few moments, during which he swept away with his hand some fallen leaves from the green bank and made a seat for her. ‘*You will be tired,” he said, gently. ‘‘Sit down and tell me what words stab you to the heart, Ailie.” There was something of constraint in the quiet tone of his voice; evidently he had an idea of what it was. ~——- “comicbooks. (eo) m