THE STEADFAST HEART
was a scholarly, aristocratic old gentleman, of a dignity to be won by a lifetime of fine living. The little girl was a beauty, with that most compelling beauty of vivacity. Already she had personality; already she was spoiled as one of her exalted station in Rainbow was bound to be. She spied Wilkins.
“Oh, Uncle Dave,” she cried. “I want you to come with me. Grandpa won’t come….”
“Lydia Canfield,” said Dave severely, “you leave me be. I’m single, and I’m going to stay so. If you don’t stop setting your cap for me.”
“I want you to come with me.”
“Madam, I jest naturally can’t, on account of being busy with something, that, thank heaven, can never touch your life…. I wonder if you’ll ever know how fortunate you are.”
Busy with something which could never touch Lydia Canfield’s life! How little one human being can know as to what life or what incident will touch and mould, will ennoble or crush, the life of another. How could Dave Wilkins guess that the business upon which he was engaged was, in the end, to be of more importance to Lydia Canfield than any other event in her history?… How could he guess that the squalid, the unspeakable past of Angus Burke could be meshed with the glowing future of this child of good fortune?…
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