Tell her here that you love her--'
"How much I love you," and now she found her hands in his, "I cannot
tell you. It seems to me that the thought of you as my wife is so
exquisite that I cannot believe it will ever come to pass. And I have
so little to offer you. Even my name is hated because it is a German
name, and my old house is German, and my father--
"But my heart's blood is for America. You know that, and so I have
dared to ask it, not that you will love me now, but that you may come
to think of loving me, so that some day you will care a little."
The birds were singing madly, the streams were shouting--Emily was
trembling. Nobody had ever wanted her like this--nobody had ever made
her feel so young and lovely and--wanted--. She had had a proposal or
two, but there had been always the sense that she had been chosen for
certain staid and sensible qualities; there had been nothing in it of
red blood and rapture.
"If you should come to us, to me and my father, you would be a queen on
a throne. If you could love me just a little in return--"
She could not answer, she just stood looking up at him, and suddenly
his arms went around her.
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