It was her love for you which drove her - '
"'Cora!' came with a sort of loving authority, 'we have buried our
erring one and passionately as I loved her, she is no more mine,
but God's. Let her woeful spirit rest. You who suffered,
supported - who sacrificed all that woman holds dear to save what,
in the nature of things, could not be saved - have more than right
to happiness if it is in my power to give it to you; I, who have
failed in so much, but never in anything more than in not seeing
where true worth and real beauty lay. Cora, there is but one hand
which can lift the shadow from my life. That hand I am holding
now - do not draw it away - it is my anchor, my hope. I dare not
confront life without the promise it holds out. I should be a
wreck - '
"His emotion stopped him and there was silence; then I heard him
utter solemnly, as befitted the place: 'Thank God!' and I knew that
she had turned her wonderful eyes upon him or nestled her hand in
his clasp as only a loving woman may.
"The next moment I heard them draw away and leave the place.
"Do you wonder that I long to know who they are and what their story
is and whom they meant by 'the erring one?'"
End of Project Gutenberg Etext The Filigree Ball, Anna Katherine Green
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