When she talked of this Richard
held his breath, and once, as he leaned forward so as not to lose a
word, he caught Aunt Barbara regarding him intently, her wrinkled cheek
flushing as she met his eye and guessed what was in his mind. If Richard
had needed any confirmation of his suspicions, that look on transparent
Aunt Barbara's face would have confirmed them. There had been something
between Ethelyn and Frank Van Buren more than a cousinly liking, and
Richard's heart throbbed powerfully as he sat by the tossing, restless
Ethelyn, moaning on about the huckleberry hills, and the ledge of rocks
where the wild laurels grew. This pain he did not try to analyze; he
only said to himself that he felt no bitterness toward Ethelyn. She was
too near to death's dark tide for that. She was Ethie--his darling--the
mother of the child that had been buried from sight before he came.
Perhaps she did not love him, and never would; but he had loved her, oh!
so much, and if he lost her he would be wretched indeed. And so,
forgiving all the past of which he knew, and trying to forgive all he
did not know, he sat by her till the sun went down, and his mother came
for the twentieth time, urging him to eat.
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