The habit of years still
fettered her tongue and kept it from uttering the name.
"If--he--comes--you know--if he comes, be kind--be good," she murmured,
her breath short and labored. "Don't--punish," she whispered--he was
yet a lad in her disordered vision. "Don't punish--forgive!"
Years had passed since then--years of peaceful mornings and placid
afternoons, and Paul had never appeared. Each purpling of the lilacs in
the spring and reddening of the apples in the fall took on new shades of
loveliness in the fond eyes of the twins, and every blade of grass and
tiny shrub became sacred to them.
On the 10th of June, their thirty-fifth birthday, the place never had
looked so lovely. A small table laid with spotless linen and gleaming
silver stood beneath the largest apple-tree, a mute witness that the
ladies were about to celebrate their birthday--the 10th of June being
the only day that the solemn dignity of the dining-room was deserted for
the frivolous freedom of the lawn.
Rachel came out of the house and sniffed the air joyfully.
"Delicious!" she murmured. "Somehow, the 10th of June is specially fine
every year."
In careful, uplifted hands she bore a round frosted cake, always the
chief treasure of the birthday feast.
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