Alpha Book

"
He paused. It is debatable if he had spoken wisely, or had spoken even
in consonance with fact, but his outburst had, at least, the saving
grace of sincerity. He was pallid now, shaking in every limb, and in his
heart was a dull aching. She seemed so incredibly soft and little and
childlike, as she looked up at him with troubled eyes.
"I--I don't quite understand," she murmured. "It isn't as if you were an
old man, Olaf. It isn't as if--"
But he had scarcely heard her. "Ah, child, child!" he cried, "why did
you come to waken me? I was content in my smug vanities. I was content
in my ignorance. I could have gone on contentedly grubbing through my
musty, sleepy life here, till death had taken me, if only you had not
shown me what life might mean! Ah, child, child, why did you waken me?"
"I?" she breathed; and now the flush of her cheeks had widened,
wondrously.
"You! you!" he cried, and gave a wringing motion of his hands, for the
self-esteem of a complacent man is not torn away without agony.


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