Tell it, and
in telling, the bitterness will pass from you. Who was this man? How
did you meet him?"
"He was a friend of Albert's. Albert introduced him."
"Albert is the man you are engaged to? The old story, the very oldest.
Why should it always be the friend? There are so many other men, but
it is always the friend who attracts." And I told Doris the story of a
friend who had once robbed me, and my story had the effect of drying
her tears. But they began again as soon as she tried to tell her own
story. There could be no doubt that she had suffered. Things are
interesting in proportion to the amount of ourselves we put into them;
Doris had clearly put all her life into this story; a sordid one it
may seem to some, a story of deception and lies, for of course Albert
was deceived as cruelly as many another good man. But Doris must have
suffered deeply, for at the memory of her sufferings her face streamed
with tears. As I looked at her tears I said: "It is strange that she
should weep so, for her story differs nowise from the many stories
happening daily in the lives of men and women. She will tell me the
old and beautiful story of lovers forced asunder by cruel fate, and
this spot is no doubt a choice one to hear her story.
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