Los Angeles herald., 1907-01-06

back to the light, and she did not know him al
first. His eyes devoured her sweet grave face,
! on which the twenty years had written only
things lovely and of good report and speech was
physical impossibty to him for few mo-
ments; but he managed TO stammer out some
thing about the veil that had been "sent to his
daughter ON approval" and paid down seventy
pounds upon the table in crisp notes.
ohe put the money thankfully, unsuspiciously
INTO her shabby purse. But suspicion dawned
Slowly IN her dark eyes when she looked up
again, and she faltered suddenly in the middle
OF sentence. turning red and white alternately;
and the colonel as suddenly found words
Oiemence! lie took her unressting hand,
ana IL would have been hard Go say which hand
trembled the most that of the quiet old maid
or the bronzed soldier Whose nerves were reputed
to be OF ron have found you at last! You
left this by accident drawing the scrap of pa.
per from his pocket-"in the box the veil was
sent IN | am twenty years late for my appoint
ment but"
She WINGED, and drew her hand away with
gentle dignity; but he would not let her speak.
Don't tell me that | am too late until YOU
have heard my defense" he pleaded "T went
away to Malta without keeping my appointment
because your cousin Jeanie told me YOU were 90
ing to marry Kinloch, though the engagement was
not announced"
Yes, | know, she said gently. "Jeanie told
me long afterwards, when she was dying"
u believed her. and the thought that you had
tiirted with me drove me mad, and in my reck
lessness and misery | married the first woman
who seemed willing to have me. | wanted YOU to
think that | did not care, and my madness
spoiled both our lives. | did not hear until af-
ter my marriage of your fathers losses and DEATH
and when | met .>lnloch again and learned how
cruelty | had been deceived, / was nearly beside
myself What must you have thought of me?
| tried to find out what had become of you but
nobody knew where you had gone. And I was
not free. But / am free now. I have been
widower for five years, and | have sought for
you in vain. ! did my best to love the woman
| married, and | do not think she ever guessed
the truth. She was Ethel's mother and the child
drew us nearer to each other, but | never forgot
you. You have always been the woman in the
world as far as I am concerned
Clarence trembling violently But when he
took her hand again she did not repuIse him.
1--WE have been robbed of twenty years of hap.
piness,' he said, his voice broken with emotion.
but we may have many years of happiness be.
fore us even now if you can forgive me-" Now
that you know all, have you the heart to send me
away Clemence?"
Ethel Bennett wore the old lace veil when she
was married, but it made previous appearance
at her fathers second wedding Clemence begged
almost with tears, that she might be married
in hat, but the colonel was obdurate ON this
particular point
''You don't look day over thirty, sweetheart"
he told her happily, when she pleaded her forty
years. Wear it you must and shall for it was
the veil that brought us together again. But
you have never told me yet why you wanted to
sell it,"
Clemence turned the question off with smile
She was safe repository of other people's
secrets.