The Gilded Age


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"
Oh! my God, I thought I hated him!"  
The Colonel knelt beside her. He took her hand and she let him keep it.  
She, looked down into his face, with a pitiable tenderness, and said in a  
weak voice.  
"And you do love me a little?"  
The Colonel vowed and protested. He kissed her hand and her lips. He  
swore his false soul into perdition.  
She wanted love, this woman. Was not her love for George Selby deeper  
than any other woman's could be? Had she not a right to him? Did he  
not belong to her by virtue of her overmastering passion? His wife--she  
was not his wife, except by the law. She could not be. Even with the  
law she could have no right to stand between two souls that were one.  
It was an infamous condition in society that George should be tied to  
her.  
Laura thought this, believed it; because she desired to believe it. She  
came to it as an original propositions founded an the requirements of her  
own nature. She may have heard, doubtless she had, similar theories that  
were prevalent at that day, theories of the tyranny of marriage and of  
the freedom of marriage. She had even heard women lecturers say, that  
marriage should only continue so long as it pleased either party to it  
408  


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406 407 408 409 410

Quick Jump
1 170 341 511 681