Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1896-03-09

He laid his hand upon the picture.
thought that he loved Marian, and she
must never know more of that love than
had been revealed to her in one mad
word, followed by goodby.
Her name in a whisper left his lips
again and again, and he flung himself
violently against the wall, throwing up
his arms like one wounded and bury
ing his head upon them. A second only
the madness lasted, and he fell to his
knees, shuddering.
The music commenced again, soft
and trembling this time, only a whis-
per. 1t was Moschowski's "Serenade"
that matchless hymn of passion that
seems to voice tho burden of heart
heavy with love. The plaintive, almost
| intolerably sweet repetition of the first
phrase came like q confession broken by
tears. 1t talked to him of love:
Love, that keeps all the choir Of lives in chime;
Love, that is blood within the veins Of time.
He held his breath in rapture. Oh,
how sweet it was!
As he staggered to his feet, still lean
ing and listening, his very soul drawn
4
He became aware that the goddess had
moved backward half an inch in her
frame. Startled, he laid his hand upon
the picture, and with u grating sound it
retreated q little more. A half open
door seemed to cape before him. He
was surely mad. But now the music
reached him more plainly. He saw that
lie must believe his senses It was q
door, unguessed by any one all these
years, and it opened into the other
house.
The mystery surrounding the old muir
der was revealed in one paralyzing
flash, and he stood quite dazed, looking
into the lamplit passage beyond. Only
a step and he would be with her. She
was SO near him now.
Temptation beckoned to him like a
laughing mistress that would not be de-
MED. This discovery had swept the
ground from beneath his feet. Still he
hesitated.
The music had changed from the bur-
den Of the prayer to that fierce cry, COM
ing as if from a riven soul where tri-
umph and despair seem incomprehensi-
bly, mingled.
Come" it seemed to say. Don't
You know that love you? Oh, am
signing out my life to you here! Come.
Let the world go by. Love is every
thing. Nothing else matters much. Oh,
comet
The surging melody swept through
his blood and poisoned it. All that was
seductive and sweet in life passed by
him i'll a vision. Reason left aim. He
no longer stared at the door like one
fascinated by something that terrified
him, but laid his hands eagerly on it,
the JOY that comes from complete aban-
donment to the worst within us glitter
ing in his eyes. The music still invited
him. There was L. resisting it now,
even If he had wished, and he did not
He crossed the threshold and care
fully pushed the picture back into its
place.
CHAPTER x
Yes, he stood within the other house.
As he paused, his heart beating quickly,
it seemed to Hugh that all the chances
of his future life were concentrated in
that one burning moment. Marian was
. there alone, and ne loved her. Every
, thing else he had valued was lost save
; this, the greatest of all, and should he
let that go, too, for ccnscience's sake?
The music seemed to answer him now
like a sigh. now like . soft, reiterated
Come, =" and he obeyed it.
u By the open window Of Mrs. Vent