I think the horror that I felt within must
have leaped to my eyes, for in an instant Von Gerhard was
beside me, steadying me with his clear blue eyes. He did
not touch the tips of my fingers as he stood there very
near me. From the look of pain on his face I knew that I
had misunderstood, somehow.
"Kleine, I see that you know me not," he said, in
German, and the saying it was as tender as is a mother
when she reproves a child that she loves. "This fight
against the world, those years of unhappiness and misery,
they have made you suspicious and lacking in trust, is it
not so? You do not yet know the perfect love that casts
out all doubt. Dawn, I ask you in the name of all that
is reasoning, and for the sake of your happiness and
mine, to divorce this man Peter Orme--this man who for
almost ten years has not been your husband--who never can
be your husband. I ask you to do something which will
bring suffering to no one, and which will mean happiness
to many. Let me make you happy--you were born to be
happy--you who can laugh like a girl in spite of your
woman's sorrows--"
But I sank into a chair and hid my face in my hands
so that I might be spared the beauty and the tenderness
of his eyes.
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