New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1901-02-13
Dora, listen to me! will saw

49, : Doil you Know the other night
l told you I hated Mrs. Charters? So
1 did. But I hated her because /
loved her. Don't you remember tell
ing me you felt sure I didn't care for
her after the ball. Yes, I did avoid
her, because I knew she was the kind
Of woman a man was safest away
from" He hesitated.
Il have no right to blame her,
Dora. But long before she called me
in to attend her she had made me un-
derstand in a hundred ways
He paused again. The girl nodded
her head silently. She was leaning
back in a chair, her eyes shut, as If
she sought blindness from the blow
which must fall. The utter forlorn-
ness of her slight figure, so still and
unresistant in it's misery, might have
turned the edge of less relentless
fate. But suddenly she sat up,
straight and aggressive, with flaming
cheeks.
Leonard, did you ever discuss ms
with her?''
Con my soul, Dora, never!" he ex-
claimed impetuously. But in a mo-
ment he added, with the appalling
self-honesty which characterized
him, .sThat is, if we did, we never
said 500
She covered her face with her hands,
for the tears would come. The I'M
conscious ''we'' smote her so cruelty.
ooh, Leonard, how could you?' she
moaned.
perhaps if you had known her as
I did he began again, after long
silence, but Dora chilled him with a
proud gesture.
Leonard she said presently,
Leonard, I must know. I must. Did
you-did you ever kiss her?''
He could have smiled. In the face
of the deep involving of his soul with
that dead woman's it seemed so
puerile query.
NO" he answered cold1y. ssBut I
would have given my soul to-
THANK you,' she said proudly
''Your frankness is admirable, but
somewhat gratuitous' She moved to
the door, but he held her as she swept
past him.
"Dora, listen! I'm going away. I've
offered my services as an army sur
geon."
She wavered, and then turned to
him helplessly. If she had not loved
him better than herself it would have
been SO easy to be proud.
"Oh Leonard, don't go! You never
loved her. You only think so now.
Some day you'll know better. You'll
know you loved me BEST
Perhaps | shall, but I don't now"
he answered, inexorably honest. 'sThe
trouble is, Dora, I've been loving two
women. Some one has said that at
heart all men are bigamists. 1t must
be true, or I can't explain myself"
She WINGED under his words, but an
intuition born of her love sustained
her even now.
you're too honest, Leonard. You
ask yourself too many questions. I
should think that doctor would have
known better than to pore over SYM
toms, like student, until he thought
he had the disease. I suppose we've
got the germ of everything in our
bodies and our souls if we chose to
look for it,
"Oh, Dora, you don't understand ;"
"Don't I? Do you suppose I didn't
know?" she demanded, with sudden
upheaving passion. 'sWhy, Leonard,
from the very night of the ball fol-
lowed it all, step by STEP
He stared at her stupidity.
eyes, and you pry and pry, and
then you're so honest that you're
brutal. Why, you're so honest that I
believe you'd almost tell a lie in max
ing sure that you told the truth"
He had never suspected this simple
child of sublety. He had thought her
as plain to him as a page of primer
prose.
All at once she turned to him with
little cry.
ooh, Leonard, don't you care any
thing for me? And I'm so good. I've
never done a thing in my life that
would be ashamed to have you know"
Her cheeks famed. "Could Mrs.
Charters have said that?"
ssNo.''
''Why, they say I'm the sweetest
girl in this town. She smiled at him
wanly.
'And I'm-well, oh you know,
Leonard" Was she going to speak
of her wealth, for whose sake so many
"Why, Leonard, you know I'm not
y