I was the
dependent--I did nothing but lean on you. We always talked of me,
not of you. It was all about my idiotic distresses and troubles.
I thought of you as a kind of wonderful being that had no mortal
or human suffering except by sympathy. You seemed to lean down
--out of a rosy cloud--to be kind to me. I never dreamed I could
do anything for YOU! I never dreamed you could need anything to
be done for you by anybody. And to-day I heard that--that you--"
"You heard that I needed to marry--some one--anybody--with money,"
she sobbed. "And you thought we were so--so desperate--you believed
that I had--"
"No!" he said, quickly. "I didn't believe you'd done one kind
thing for me--for that. No, no, no! I knew you'd NEVER thought
of me except generously--to give. I said I couldn't make it
plain!" he cried, despairingly.
"Wait!" She lifted her head and extended her hands to him
unconsciously, like a child. "Help me up, Bibbs." Then, when she
was once more upon her feet, she wiped her eyes and smiled upon him
ruefully and faintly, but reassuringly, as if to tell him, in that
way, that she knew he had not meant to hurt her. And that smile
of hers, so lamentable, but so faithfully friendly, misted his own
eyes, for his shamefacedness lowered them no more.
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