Page:Maurine and Other Poems (1910).pdf/80

 Of distant countries which we both had seen. But once I thought I saw his large eyes light With sudden passion, when there came a pause In our chit-chat, and then he spoke:

“Maurine, I saw a number of your friends in Rome. We talked of you. They seemed surprised, because You were not ’mong the seekers for a name. They thought your whole ambition was for fame.”

“It might have been,” I answered, “when my heart Had nothing else to fill it. Now my art Is but a recreation. I have this To love and live for, which I had not then.” And, leaning down, I pressed a tender kiss Upon my child’s fair brow.

“And yet,” he said, The old light leaping to his eyes again, “And yet, Maurine, they say you might have wed A noble Baron! one of many men Who laid their hearts and fortunes at your feet. Why won the bravest of them no return?” I bowed my head, nor dared his gaze to meet. On cheek and brow I felt the red blood burn, And strong emotion strangled speech.

He rose And came and knelt beside me.

“Sweet, my sweet!” He murmured softly, “God in Heaven knows How well I loved you seven years ago. He only knows my anguish, and my grief, When your own acts forced on me the belief That I had been your plaything and your toy. Yet from his lips I since have learned that Roy Held no place nearer than a friend and brother. And then a faint suspicion, undefined, Of what had been—was—might be, stirred my mind, And that great love, I thought died at a blow, Rose up within me, strong with hope and life.

“Before all heaven and the angel mother Of this sweet child that slumbers on your heart, Maurine, Maurine, I claim you for my wife—