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She no longer wore coat and hat, and the absence of the latter revealed a glory of golden hair that became instantly a rival to the sunshine in that drear bare room. "No, Peters," she said, "you mustn't go. We couldn't permit it. Mamma and I will go." She continued to smile at the obviously dazzled Peters. Suddenly he spoke in a determined tone: "No don't do that. I'll stay."
She returned a gray-haired woman of thirty-four, who had lost youth, fortune, child, and husband; whose aspect, moreover, suggested losses still deeper and more drear. At first she wrapped herself in what seemed to some a dull and to others a tragic silence. But suddenly a flame leaped up in her.
It was some church bell tolling the hour. My pleasing fancies dispersed I again faced the drear reality of my position. Twelve o'clock! Midday or midnight? I could not tell. I began to calculate. It was early morning when I had been taken ill not much past eight when I had met the monk and sought his assistance for the poor little fruit-seller who had after all perished alone in his sufferings.
And they dwelt henceforth in the land of the arrow of their Deliverer and were at peace, forgetting their former home and their drear wandering over the pathless sea, and taking perchance unto themselves wives from among the ancient holders of the soil. Now the place where they abode is called Chittapolana or Chiplun unto this day.
Cold indeed, it looked, through the small, smoky window, to the eyes of the young and beautiful woman who lay dying of hectic fever in a dark, musty room back of the shop of Mrs. Fipps, the milliner, in lower Main Street cold and friendless and drear.
She loved him as a kind elder brother; a relation to guide, protect, and instruct her, without the too frequent tyranny of parental authority. She adored his virtues, and with mixed contempt and indignation she saw Evadne pile drear sorrow on his head, for the sake of one who hardly marked her.
So she built her palace and filled it with all things such as she thought the sun would like, not forgetting an abundance of fire to warm him, lest even her love would prove insufficient for one of so fiery a nature. Then she dismissed her attendants and sat down alone to wait his coming. The day seemed long and drear and weary; but she had seen him watching her, and he was coming at last.
O friend whose words of wisdom rare Inspire my soul to do and dare, Across the distance wide and drear I will not reach to bring you near. Why cast ideal grace away To find you only common clay? The best of life and thought and speech Is that which lies just out of reach.
The next day on riding through the forest about three miles they found that it terminated, leaving a field of sand without a blade of grass or shrub growing upon it. It was nothing but sand, drear and desolate as far as the eye could reach. They were stupefied, and gazed sadly on the barren waste before them.
He groaned, and sat down painfully, near the top. His head lolled forward, and he supported it on two shaking hands. Thus he sat, huddled and miserable, for five minutes or thereabouts. The chime rang out overhead the old hymn which the little Crown Prince so often sang to it: "Draw me also, Mary mild, To adore Thee and thy Child! Mary mild, Star in desert drear and wild."
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