Lady Evelyn — page 256: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

After Twenty Years. z 249 Her eyes shone through their tears, at peace now. They dwelt upon him with.an angelic look, full of an af- fection free from every tair* of earthly passion—the gaze of a mother upon a beloved and long-lost son. “And you will tell me all now—vour past!” she said, softly. “And why it is we have met at last ?” Fle seated himself beside her. Her face elimmered white as that of the spirit in the wan light as she lay back to listen. He told her all—his escape from prison by faithful Mike Muldoon; that terrible struggle for life on tie cliff with the man who was her husband; of his second rescue from death by Mike; of the cruel news of his fath- ers death and her marriage, which had reached him in \ elbourne, and which had made him a wanderer and an exile ever after. He told her of his marriage, of its tragic ending, of his daughter, of the meeting in St. Louis be- tween himself, Trevannance, Mignonnette, and _ poor, wounded Mike. | He told her all—of his love for her daughter; his _ strange encounter with Morgan; the death-bed confession, and that last interview in the library so awfully closed. She listened, deadly pale, breathlessly interested, but — never interrupting until the story's end. ‘Then she strove to rise. “I must go to.my husband,” she said. “If he is stricken by the hand of God, my place is by his side.” She struggled to get up, but Roderick held her gently back. 3 ‘Not yet, Inez. Evelyn is with him, and the orders of the medical man are that no one else save the nurse be ad- mitted. You are able to do nothing. He lies insensible to everything. You must wait until the morning.” She looked at him wistfully as he arose to go. “Pardon me, Roderick, but how is it you could leave your daughter to struggle alone in those large, terrible cities, young and beautiful as she must be? It is not like you.” “The fault was not mine. She had learned to hateme ~~ all her life, and was quite unmanageable in her pride and ~ independence. Jf can do nothing with her; but I think I know some one who can,’’ with a smile. poe “Ah!a lover?” a0 comicbooks.com —