"
He got on his feet and stood before her, his empty palms hanging at his
sides in that strange gesture of entire hopelessness; he tried to speak,
but no words came. The lamp on the table flickered a little.
Their shadows loomed gigantic on the wall behind them; the little hot
room was very still.
"You think you don't love me?" Athalia said, between set teeth;
"_I know better!_" With a laugh she caught his arm with both
her shaking hands, and kissed him once, and then again.
Still he was silent. Then with a cry she threw herself against
his breast. "I love you," she said, passionately, "and you love me!
Nothing on earth will make me believe you don't love me,"--
and for one vital moment her lips burned against his.
His arms did not close about her,--but his hands clinched slightly.
Then he moved back a step or two, and she heard him sigh.
"Don't, sister," he said, gently.
She threw up her hands with a frantic gesture. "SISTER? My God!"
she said; and left him.
* * *
There was no further struggle between them. A week later she went away.
As he told her, "the house was there"--and to that she went until she
should go to find some whirl of life that would make her deaf to voices
of the past.
As for Lewis, he did not see that miserable departure from the
Family House in the shabby old carryall that had been the Shakers'
one vehicle for more than thirty years. He told Nathan he wanted
to mow the burial-ground up on the hill that morning.
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