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would still be in his clutches and by this time he would have been beyond all
hope of capture. How can we ever repay you, dear friend?"
"
That you were generous enough to arrange when we first embarked upon the
search for your daughter," replied von Horn.
"Just so, just so," said the professor, but a shade of trouble tinged the expression
of his face, and a moment later he arose, saying that he felt weak and tired and
would go to his sleeping room and lie down for a while. The fact was that
Professor Maxon regretted the promise he had made von Horn relative to his
daughter.
Once before he had made plans for her marriage only to regret them later; he
hoped that he had made no mistake this time, but he realized that it had scarcely
been fair to Virginia to promise her to his assistant without first obtaining her
consent. Yet a promise was a promise, and, again, was it not true that but for
von Horn she would have been dead or worse than dead in a short time had she
not been rescued from the clutches of the soulless Bulan? Thus did the old man
justify his action, and clinch the determination that he had before reached to
compel Virginia to wed von Horn should she, from some incomprehensible
motive, demur. Yet he hoped that the girl would make it easy, by accepting
voluntarily the man who had saved her life.
Left alone, or as he thought alone, with the girl in the growing shadows of the
evening, von Horn thought the moment propitious for renewing his suit. He did
not consider the natives squatting about them as of sufficient consequence to
consider, since they would not understand the language in which he addressed
Virginia, and in the dusk he failed to note that Sing squatted with the Dyaks,
close behind them.
"Virginia," he commenced, after an interval of silence, "often before have I
broached the subject nearest to my heart, yet never have you given me much
encouragement. Can you not feel for the man who would gladly give his life for
you, sufficient affection to permit you to make him the happiest man in the
world? I do not ask for all your love at first--that will come later. Just give me the
right to cherish and protect you. Say that you will be my wife, Virginia, and we
need have no more fears that the strange vagaries of your father's mind can ever
again jeopardize your life or your happiness as they have in the past."
"I feel that I owe you my life," replied the girl in a quiet voice, "and while I am now
positive that my father has entirely regained his sanity, and looks with as great
abhorrence upon the terrible fate he planned for me as I myself, I cannot forget
the debt of gratitude which belongs to you.
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