eBooks Base 2000

He leaned against a tree, and sent his voice like
a clarion before him: "Teresa!" There was no reply. He called again. A
faint cry at his back from the trail he had just traversed made him
turn. Only a few paces behind him, blinded and staggering, but
following like a beaten and wounded animal, Teresa halted, knelt,
clasped her hands, and dumbly held them out before her. "Teresa!" he
cried again, and sprang to her side.
She caught him by the knees, and lifted her face imploringly to his.
"Say that again!" she cried, passionately. "Tell me it was Teresa you
called, and no other! You have come back for me! You would not let me
die here alone!"
He lifted her tenderly in his arms, and cast a rapid glance around him.
It might have been his fancy, but there seemed a dull glow in the
direction he had come.
"You do not speak!" she said. "Tell me! You did not come here to seek
her?"
"Whom?" he said quickly.
"Nellie!"
With a sharp cry he let her slip to the ground. All the pent-up agony,
rage, and mortification of the last hour broke from him in that
inarticulate outburst.


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