Of course
Stephen will be dreadfully hampered by the toss of his barn, and maybe he
wants to let your house that was to be, because he really needs money. In
that case the dooryard won't be very attractive to tenants, with corn
planted right up to the steps and no path left! It's two feet tall now, and
by August (just when you were intending to move in) it will hide the front
windows. Not that you'll care, with a diamond on your engagement finger!
The letter was more than flesh and blood could stand, and Rose flung herself
on her bed to think and regret and repent, and, if possible, to sob herself to
sleep.
She knew now that she had never admired and respected Stephen so much as at
the moment when, under the reproach of his eyes, she had given him back his
ring. When she left Edgewood and parted with him forever she had really loved
him better than when she had promised to marry him.
Claude Merrill, on his native Boston heath, did not appear the romantic,
inspiring figure he had once been in her eyes. A week ago she distrusted him;
tonight she despised him.
What had happened to Rose was the dilation of her vision. She saw things under
a wider sky and in a clearer light.
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