The older spoke softly and quickly, "Don't you feel a little gentle to her
when you think she's going to be his wife and the mother of his child? I
would like to put my arms round her and touch her once, if she would let
me. She is so beautiful, they say."

"Oh, I could never bear to see her; it would kill me. And they are so
happy together today! He is loving her so!"

"Don't you want him to be happy?" The older woman looked down at her.
"Have you never loved him, at all?"

The younger woman's face was covered with her hands. "Oh, it's so
terrible, so dark! and I shall go on living year after year, always in this
awful pain! Oh, if I could only die!"

The older woman stood looking into the fire; then slowly and measuredly she
said, "There are times, in life, when everything seems dark, when the brain
reels, and we cannot see that there is anything but death. But, if we wait
long enough, after long, long years, calm comes. It may be we cannot say
it was well; but we are contented, we accept the past. The struggle is
ended. That day may come for you, perhaps sooner than you think." She
spoke slowly and with difficulty.

"No, it can never come for me. If once I have loved a thing, I love it for
ever. I can never forget."

"Love is not the only end in life. There are other things to live for."

"Oh, yes, for you! To me love is everything!"