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A Touch of Sun and Other Stories by Mary Hallock Foote
page 30 of 191 (15%)
from its high society pitch. "I did not dream there was so much mercy in
the world--among parents! You both knew, and you have not told him. You
deserve to have Willy for your son!"

Mrs. Thorne leaned forward to speak. Her husband, guessing what trouble her
conscience would be making her, forestalled the effort with a warning look.
"There was no mercy in the case," he bluntly said; "we do not know your
story."

Miss Benedet continued, as if thinking aloud: "Yet you gave me that supreme
trust, that I would tell him myself! I have not, and now it is too late.
Now I can never know how he would have taken it had he known in time. I
do not want his forgiveness, you may be sure, or his toleration. I must
be what I was to him or nothing. You will tell him, and then he will
understand the letter I wrote him last night, breaking the engagement.
We may be honest with each other now; there is no peace of the family to
provide for. This night's talk, and I leave myself, my whole self, with
you, to do with as you think best for him. If you think better to have it
over at one blow, tell him the worst. The facts are enough if you leave
out the excuses. But if you want to soften it for the sake of his faith
in general,--isn't there some such idea, that men lose their faith in all
women through the fault of one?--why, soften it all you like. Make me the
victim of circumstances. I can show you how. I had forgiven myself, you
know. I thought I was as good as new. I had forgotten I had a flaw. And I
was so tired of being on the defensive. Now at last, I said, I shall have a
friend! You know--_do_ you know what a restful, impersonal manner your son
has? What quiet eyes! We rode and talked together like two young men. It
seems a pleasure common enough with some girls, but I never had it; lads of
my own age were debarred when I was a girl. I had neither girls nor boys to
play with. Girl friends were dealt out to me to fit my supposed needs, but
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