Burnamy."
"Light the candle," said her father. "Or no," he added before she could
do so. "Is it quite settled?"
"Quite," she answered in a voice that admitted of no doubt. "That is, as
far as it can be, without you."
"Don't be a hypocrite, Agatha," said the general. "And let me try to get
to sleep. You know I don't like it, and you know I can't help it."
"Yes," the girl assented.
"Then go to bed," said the general concisely.
Agatha did not obey her father. She thought she ought to kiss him, but
she decided that she had better postpone this; so she merely gave him a
tender goodnight, to which he made no response, and shut herself into her
own room, where she remained sitting and staring out into the moonlight,
with a smile that never left her lips.
When the moon sank below the horizon, the sky was pale with the coming
day, but before it was fairly dawn, she saw something white, not much
greater than some moths, moving before her window. She pulled the valves
open and found it a bit of paper attached to a thread dangling from
above. She broke it loose and in the morning twilight she read the great
central truth of the universe:
"I love you. L. J. B."
She wrote under the tremendous inspiration:
"So do I.
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