Yes, and before her also. They had not spent all those hours
together without talking of themselves. No matter that she was
cheerful, that youth gave her courage and a ready smile, there was
still a finality about blindness that sometimes frightened her. She,
too, was aware--and sometimes afraid--of drab years running out into
nothingness.
Hollister sat beside her visualizing interminable to-morrows in which
there would be no Doris Cleveland; in which he would go his way vainly
seeking the smile on a friendly face, the sound of a voice that
thrilled him with its friendly tone.
He took her hand and held it, looking down at the soft white fingers.
She made no effort to withdraw it. He looked at her, peering into her
face, and there was nothing to guide him. He saw only a curious
expectancy and a faint deepening of the color in her cheeks.
"Don't go back to the Euclataws, Doris," he said at last. "I love you.
I want you. I need you. Do you feel as if you liked me--enough to take
a chance?
"For it is a chance," he finished abruptly.
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