New Britain herald. [microfilm reel] (New Britain, Conn.) 1890-1976, 1927-07-01
CHAPTER LVH
LYRA DENIES HER LOVE

Yes / told your mother so."'
Lyra Hilliard answered complacently.
when Phillip told her she had made
him poet.
/ The words were hardly out of her
mouth when she knew by Phillips
! face that she had made mistake.
Quickly, to change the subject. she
said:
II thought you would be married
before you returned from France.
have been looking for an announce
ment every day."
! II do not know why you should
be thinking that" said Phil. stupidity.
Il should think that you, of all peo-
pie, Lyra, would not want me to
marry a French girl"
Lyra drew a little sobbirg breath.
She knew that she had only to say,
Dear boy, l will love you as long
as time shall last" and he would be
hers again.
She also new that If Phillip Tracy
came back to her. his life would be
ruined foreyer-because when he
tired of her. as he inevitably would.
he would become blase man of the
world, who believed in nothing or
no one, not even himself.
Her idea OF fair play and her
heart were fighting each other hard.
Finally she said, softly:
But you know, Phillip I don't
love YOU
Phillip Wynne Tracy ~ sprang
from the arm Of the chair. From his
feet he looked down upon her. She
looked very frail and white, huddled
in the depths Of the cushions.
What do you mean. Lyra," he
asked curtly.
II mean Just what l have said.
have never loved you, and what you
have called love for me was only one
of your youthful vagrant fancies."
You're crazy. Surely you. Of all
persons, should know better than
that
Its because / am 1.-The one who
is different from all others-that ]
know better than anyone else that
IL was NaSfant fancy.
You ill forgive me, Lyra. when
say that l do not understand you"
Phillips voice was ice.
Come back here and sit on the
arm of my chair again. and l will
see IL I can make you understand.
Like sullen, reluctant child. he
sat down, although he did not lean
toward the woman also buried in the
depths OF the chair.
Sitting very straight, SO that he
could look directly at her. he tried
to fathom what she meant. With a
catch in her throat that was hardly
audible, Lyra turned her face to his.
I'm going to say something to
YOU. Phillip. that few women have
dared to think and probably none of
them has ever before had the temer-
ity to tell any man whose respect
she wanted to retain.
Phillip" she said, and her low
voice was very sad. l have never
loved you or any of the others that
came into or went out of my life.
ilNt oLeio"o iSloo p6ahC.
Phil shook himself as though he
were trying to wake up.
Surely, you know, dear, that you
were not the first nor the last"
He looked blankly at her as she
continued: 80 But what you have not
known, and what few would believe.
either men or women, If I had told
them, was that | have loved but one
man in all my life, and that man
is-iny husband"
How horrible!" Phil did not
know that he had spoken until Lyra
answered his exclamation.
Yes. Phillip. that is what the
world would say of me, but If man
had told you anything like this
about himself. would YOU have be-
lieved that he could have loved his
wife truly and yet betrayed her Oft
eno"
perhaps" The word seemed
twisted from his set lips.
phillip" Lyra Hilliard came
closer to the arm Of the chair on
which he was sittiry. She did not
touch him. Don't you know that
women are no different from men"
Some human beings both male and
female, arc born with overwhelm-