Then--"I am going
to tell you something, dear boy, that only two people in the world
beside myself ever knew, and they are both dead, many years now. I am
going to tell you, because I feel--because I think--that, perhaps,
it may help you a little. I, too, Brian, had my dreams when I was a
girl,--my dreams of happiness,--such as every true woman hopes for;--of
a home with all that home means;--of a lover-husband;--of little
ones who would call me 'mother';--and my dreams ended, Brian, on a
battlefield of the Civil War. He went from me the very day we were
promised. He never returned. I have always felt that we were as truly
one as though the church had solemnized and the law had legalized our
union. I promised that I would wait for him."
"And you--you have kept that promise? You have been true to that
memory?" Brian Kent asked, wonderingly.
"I have been true to him, Brian;--all the years of my life I have been
true to him."
Brian Kent bowed his head, reverently.
Rising, the old gentlewoman went close to him, and put her hands on his
shoulders. "Brian, dear, I have told you my secret because I thought
it might help you to know. Oh, my boy--my boy,--don't--don't let
anything--don't let anyone--kill your faith in womanhood! No matter how
bitter your experience, you can believe, now, that there are women who
can be faithful and true.
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