It came first
into my mind years ago, at Geneva, and I have never lost the wish.
Ah! how grateful you would make me, if, forgetting ourselves, you
would join me in somehow trying to bring about this happiness for
those two! Piers is coming to live in London. Do see as much of him
as you can. I think very, very highly of him, and he is almost as
dear to me as a son of my own. Speak to him of Olga. Sometimes a
suggestion--and you know that I desire only his good."
The voice spoke to him from the grave; it had a sweeter tone than
that other. He read on; he came to the last sheet--so sad, so
hopeless, that it brought tears to his eyes.
"Cannot you defend me? Cannot you prove the falsehood of that story?
Cannot you save me from this bitter disgrace? Oh, who will show the
truth and do me justice?"
Could he burn that letter? Could he close his ears against that cry
of one driven to death by wrong?
He drew a deep sigh, and looked about him as if waking from a bad
dream. Why, he had come near to whole brotherhood with a man as
coldly cruel and infamous as any that walked the earth! Destroying
these letters, he would have been worse than Daniel.
Straightway he wrote to Olga, requesting the appointment with her.
Upon Olga once more he fixed his mind. He resolved that he would not
part from her without asking her to be his wife. If he had but done
so before hearing that news from John Jacks! Then it seemed to him
that Olga was his happiness.
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