Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1901-07-21

er's letter, her cousin, or herself, she
did not explain.
Poor Eva. In the room above she sal
alone face to face with the problem she
had just propounded, How shall we
ever live withou, him?" From the day
when she first came to their home, q
little black -robed orphan, with Maria's
dreary platitudes on the duty of resig-
nation ringing in her ears, and he
though ten years her senior, had en-.
tered into her feelings and surrounded
her with new sunshine of love, he hac
become all in all to her.
Gradually and naturally to himself
as the years passed by. he had changed
his protective tenderness for the chile
into the affectionate friendship of com.
radeship, and 1t was not his fault thai
with her the change did not come about
in the same way. A man whose ma
ture is strong does not readily merge
sort of love he has to give to a wife;
but with the opposite sex the rever-
ence, the reliance, the hero-worship oil
childhood, insensible drift into what
might be, were it sought, the perfect
| love of wifehood.
She loved him. she loved him, and
she could not live without him. Had
he been happy, contented, married to
,Helga or even to Lady Emilia, she could
have accepted her fate. But how ac-
cept it now with his letter lying before
her?
In the opening it told her only what
Maria knew, but then in the full as
surance of her ready sympathy. in ut
ter ignorance Of the source from which
that sympathy sprang, it added the
whole truth.
Il have written to Maria already and
given her all these business details,
but my last act before set out Is to
write to you. Maria knows that l am
about to travel and where | am going
You will know when you hear that my
destination Is the Siberian mines) what
I am doing and why | do it. l be-
lieve that have found Helga, and am
about to follow her. If find her it
will no longer be possible for me to
bring her back to England and safety;
therefore in order to have some chance
of protecting her where she is going, l
shall, on finding her, apply to the Car
for permission to make her my wife.
/ wonder If you can understand the po-
sitions that you do not regard me on
| the one hand as sacrificed, nor on the
| other fall into the belief that l did not
know my own mind when l spoke to
you? l might say that the legal obsta-
! Gle to our marriage uncertainty as to
her husbands fate) has been removed.
But that would be to make truth lie,
| for her husbands existence would only
have postponed our union, it could new
er have separated us.
There was time when I could say,
with the unhappy Moor: If Heaven
had made me such another world, Of
one entire and perfect chrysoiteI'd not
have given her for it, That time,
with all it's glorious illusions, has pass
| ed, and yet in a way l love her quite as
much as ever / did. l cannot think OF
! her with any calmness yet. 1 cannot
imagine any material Joy so great as
| that to which | am almost certainly 60
ing. l know that she can and will
compensate me, with this material gain
| for all the material loss my journey
must involve Therefore 1 am in no
way sacrificed to her. But, inasmuch
as she cannot give me what does not
exist-the lHelga Of my dreams-if
election were still possible to me, be-
lieve that l would not follow her. Hav-
ing dreamt that dream. my life with the
reality will always be incomplete. |
could wish, when / And myself weak as
water at the mere thought of once more
seeing her, that 4 loved her less and
! sacrificed more to her.
| 81 don't know why tell you all this
| set out to write myself down perfect.
| ly happy and content, that your friend
| ship might answer mine with the sen
| try's salute, All well!' But even this
well-meant deception is impossible. AL
is not we'll The world has gone bitter
ly wrong with me. would like Il
come to peace and to you-to the calm
life OF our comradeship, Of mutual en-
deavor, and to be done forever will
these feverish dreams.
II have taken up one duty and left al
the rest For Heavens sake, Eva, d.
not let my little vineyard go to ruin be
cause am not there to TIL it. You will
always have enough for yourself.
give you my purse. Use it to buy mi
moral exemption, as 1t were. Neve
think of saving. though l know you vii
| get many a lesson on extravaganza
Never, SO far as time permits, be salts
fed with your name on the back of
cheque for this or that. don't wan
to make you philanthropist buyin
fame ON easy terms. On the contrar,