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Manners, J. Hartley, 1870-1928

"Peg O' My Heart"

Where poverty was but a word, an' misery had no place.
An' ye've seen it, Peg. An' the whole wurrld has changed for ye,
Peg. An' from now you'll sit in judgment on the dead and gone days
of yer youth--an' in judgment on me--"
She interrupted him violently:
"What are ye sayin' to me at all! _I_ sit in judgment on YOU! What
do ye think I've become? Let me tell ye I've come back to ye a
thousand times more yer child than I was when I left ye. What I've
gone through has only strengthened me love for ye and me reverence
for yer life's work. _I_ MAY have changed. But don't we all change
day by day, even as we pass them close to each other. An' if the
change is for the betther, where's the harm? I HAVE changed, father.
There's somethin' wakened in me I never knew before. It's a WOMAN
I've brought ye back instead o' the GIRL I left. An' it's the
WOMAN'LL stand by ye, father, even as the child did when I depended
on ye for every little thing. There's no power in the wurrld'll ever
separate us!"
She clung to him hysterically.
Even while she protested the most, he felt the strange new note in
her life. He held her firmly and looked into her eyes.
"There's one thing, Peg, that must part us, some day, when it comes
to you.


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