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Childhood by Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy
page 101 of 132 (76%)
reciprocity--could not even think of it, yet my heart was overflowing
with happiness. I could not imagine that the feeling of love which was
filling my soul so pleasantly could require any happiness still greater,
or wish for more than that that happiness should never cease. I felt
perfectly contented. My heart beat like that of a dove, with the blood
constantly flowing back to it, and I almost wept for joy.

As we passed through the hall and peered into a little dark store-room
beneath the staircase I thought: "What bliss it would be if I could pass
the rest of my life with her in that dark corner, and never let anybody
know that we were there!"

"It HAS been a delightful evening, hasn't it?" I asked her in a low,
tremulous voice. Then I quickened my steps--as much out of fear of what
I had said as out of fear of what I had meant to imply.

"Yes, VERY!" she answered, and turned her face to look at me with an
expression so kind that I ceased to be afraid. I went on:

"Particularly since supper. Yet if you could only know how I regret" (I
had nearly said) "how miserable I am at your going, and to think that
we shall see each other no more!"

"But why SHOULDN'T we?" she asked, looking gravely at the corner of
her pocket-handkerchief, and gliding her fingers over a latticed screen
which we were passing. "Every Tuesday and Friday I go with Mamma to the
Iverskoi Prospect. I suppose you go for walks too sometimes?"

"Well, certainly I shall ask to go for one next Tuesday, and, if they
won't take me I shall go by myself--even without my hat, if necessary. I
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