Oh, Edith, Edith,
Edith, my soul goes after her even now with a quenchless, mighty
love, and my poor, bruised, blistered heart throbs as if some
great giant hand were pressing its festered wounds, until I faint
with anguish and cry out, 'my punishment is greater than I can
bear.'
"Still I would not have it otherwise, if I could. I deserve it
all, aye, and more, too. Heaven bless them both, Richard and his
beautiful singing bird. Tell her so, Grace. Tell her how I blessed
her for cheering the blind man's darkness, but do not tell her how
much it costs me to bid her, as I now do, farewell forever and
ever, farewell."
It was strange that Grace should have shown this letter to Edith,
but the latter coaxed so hard that she reluctantly consented,
repenting of it however when she saw the effect it had on Edith.
Gradually as she read, there crept over her a look which Grace had
never seen before upon the face of any human being--a look as if
the pent-up grief of years was concentrated in a single moment of
anguish too acute to be described.
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