"Miggie, sister, won't you?"
Edith shook her head, not very decidedly, it is true, still it was
a negative shake, and Nina said, "Arthur boy, will you?"
"No, Nina, no."
Hia answer was determined, and poor, discouraged Nina sobbed
aloud, "Who will, who will?"
In the adjoining room there was a rustling sound--a coming
footstep, and Victor Dupres appeared in the door. He had been an
unwilling hearer of that conversation, and when Nina cried "who
will?" he started up, and coming into the room as if by accident,
advanced to the bedside and asked in his accustomed friendly way,
"How is Nina to-night?" Then bending over her so that no one
should hear, he whispered softly, "Don't tell them, but I'll read
that letter to Richard!"
Nina understood him and held his hand a moment while she looked
the thanks she dared not speak.
"Nina must not talk any more" Arthur said, as Victor walked away,
"she is wearing out too fast," and with motherly tenderness he
smoothed her tumbled pillow--pushed back behind her ears the
tangled curls--kissed her forehead, and then went out into the
deepening night, whose cool damp air was soothing to his burning
brow, and whose sheltering mantle would tell no tales of his white
face or of the cry which came heaving up from where the turbulent
waters lay, "if it be possible let this temptation pass from me,
or give me strength to resist it.
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