It's like seeing
a man hung."
She led him, unresisting, to a bench in the corner of the dark little
triangle that was called a "square." People were passing by, but no
one had stopped there to rest, or to reflect, or to make love. They
had the green little park all to themselves.
"Christine was married to-night," she said after they had been seated
for a few minutes.
He remarked lifelessly: "Hurried it up on my account, eh? It's bad
luck to postpone a wedding, even for a death in the family. Well, I'm
glad. She's sure to be happy, God bless her!"
"Yes, she will be very happy."
"I suppose she--and you, too--had a notion that I'd turn up some day
to spoil the whole business. So you got it over with, eh?"
"I wanted everything to be settled, that's all."
He was silent for a while, breathing heavily.
"Did she ask about me?"
"Yes."
"You told her I was going away--that I'd probably never see her
again?"
"I told her you were gone."
"I suppose she was relieved."
"She cried because you were not there to see her married."
He was fully half a minute in grasping the full meaning of that
wonderful sentence.
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