Marion Marlowe's True Heart, or, How a Daughter Forgave — page 25: what you’re looking at

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

Miss H , Miss Marlowe, She is suf- - fering greatly, and I am too busy.” _ “What! Leave Kittie now?” whispered ~ Marion in horror. _ “She is dead,” said Miss Williams, with a quick glance at Kittie. “The living first, Miss Marlowe, the living and suffering.” ~ Marion went mutely across the ward, mas- tering her grief as she went. In that one ' short week she had learned to love Kittie. “Tt will soon kill me at this rate,” she rea- ; soned to herself. “Oh, I must learn not to sympathize so deeply with my patients.” _ At sunrise the next morning Marion stood by one of the windows of the hospital, look- ing out upon the water, that glinted and _ gleamed all around her. A group of convicts were busy mending a _ broken spot in the sea-wall, their two guards standing idly by, each armed with a rifle. * “Here is the picture Kittie spoke of,” said Miss Williams, coming up to her. “You can look at it, Miss Marlowe, and then you must go to bed, It is not necessary for you to work day and night, even if you are a ‘pro- -bationer.’” : She slipped a picture into Marion? S ae m and went away. She was too busy herself to think of sleeping. A great beam of the _ that instant and Marion’s eyes were slightly: _ dazzled as she looked at the picture. a Then with a stifled’ cream Marion dropped _ the bit of pasteboard from her hand. _ _ It was a picture of Reginald Brookes— a _ frank, blue-eyed and handsome ! ~ CHAPTER XT. A DESPERATE CHANCE. For a few hours that day Marion remained quietly in her room. She was not expected _ on duty, and it was fortunate for her that _ they could spare her. a She had returned the picture of Reginald Brookes without a word to Miss Williams, ie but the revelation it had brought to her dis- _ tressed her beyond’ expression. a “Tt must be a mistake,” she whispered ‘over , pend over. “The thing is impossible! Iti is too utterly horrible!” a3 $4 é Thep the dying girl’s words came back to MY QUEEN. her distinctly. golden sun fell upon the window panes at -der if she died in Bellevue, after all. 23 On her deathbed it was not probable that Kittie would have told a‘ false- hood: Marion was glad when the batch of letters was handed to her. ‘They would serve to fake her mind from this dreadful subject. ‘The first letter was from Dollie, telling of her success as a typewriter, “I am getting on famously,” she wrote, “and as my employer is old and bald, Ralph has not yet become jealous. Miss Allyn and I love.our little flat better every day, and the only thing we miss that would make us per-_ fectly happy is the daily companionship of my darling sister.” Marion smiled very happily as she folded the letter. “Dear Dollie! She is perfectly happy, and, oh! Iam so glad for her. Not for worlds would I darken her life with so rhuch as a a » ‘ 9 39 glimpse,of the misery I am witnessing! The next letter was from her mother, and Marion opened it eagerly. She was almost sure to hear some news of Sallie. As she read the first page her brow grew dark, and _at the end she crumpled the letter angrily in her hand. ‘ “Silas Johnson’ is a brute! Oh, how I despise him!” she cried. “To think that he received my letter and paid no attention to it! He did not care enough about his wife to even go and get her. Poor Sallie! I won- Cr, “TF almost wish I had followed the ambulance, and I wouid have done it if I hadn’t promised to take the Thomas Brennan.” She paced the floor for awhile in great per- plexity. If Sallie was living she felt that she must know it. P It and her cheeks crim- After a time she opened another letter. was from. Mr. Ray, soned as she read it. “After all, there is at least one good man in the world yet,” she said, bitterly ; “and they are leaving England to-day, he and his sister, and how happy I Hel be to renew their ac- quaintance.” As Marion went to pick up the ies letter _ she shrank back in alarm. The handwriting was not familiar, but nevertheless she could guess who was the writer. Connicbooo! SoC