Page:By Sanction of Law.pdf/96

 some distance away, on corners of the quadrangle.

Having noted the seriousness of the girl in her whispered request Truman waited for her to begin speaking and wondered. Lida was at a loss how to begin the subject, though the question seemed to be burning at the end of her tongue. When they had nearly reached the corner of the field in which the track for sprinters started she halted, her arm still resting on that of her escort.

Truman stood facing her as she almost clung pitifully to him. As they stood, suddenly her head drooped and she began to sob softly. Her anguish communicated itself to him.

"Lida, Mine, what's troubling you," he asked, a world of tenderness in his voice.

For reply she sobbed all the harder. He pleaded to be told her trouble. At last her grief seemed spent and she looked up.

"Truman, I love you, and I don't want to hurt you. I trust you and have trusted you with my life. I—I—I—don't know what to do." She burst into a fit of passionate weeping again.

All the love of her heart seemed to go to this man and she wanted him as she had wanted nothing else in the world. Fear to lose him if she asked the question and he became offended rivalled a fear that the words she wished not to hear might be spoken.

"I don't know what to do," she sobbed again.

"You'll not hurt me dear, unless you persist in weeping and not telling me what your trouble is. Nothing can hurt