Page:Arthur Stringer-The Loom of Destiny.djvu/209

The Heart's Desire where he let them rest with intuitive tenderness.

It was the strangest love confession ever made to her. But it was a love confession. And she was a woman.

She slipped her own arms around the child and drew him close to her. There had been some one else, once, who had made the same confession. And now there came a dozen every season, yet that one, the real one, seemed very long ago, and it had been very hard work to keep from getting lonely.

But the sniffing Davis had pulled up with a jerk at Perkins Alley. The woman sighed, and the child's face lost its light.

"Won't you kiss me good-bye before you go, dear?" said the Angel.

Some old portal of memory swung back and Teddy kissed the girl on her eyes, as some one long ago—he could not remember who—used to kiss him.

"Yer eyes is orfully salty tastin'," said the child.

The girl did not answer. She was thinking how He had said to her once, long ago: 197