THE GIRL IN HIS HOUSE
rooms. In my mind you have become an integral part of the house. It is morally as well as legally yours now. Your father's purchase was made in good faith. You cannot give it back to me now if you wished."
"Everything is in my name. You are like I am; we lie awkwardly and badly. But if I lied it was because I was terribly proud and unhappy. My father! . . . Could you love a shadow man? . . . I have never seen my father. All I have is the photograph and his letters. I have never seen him. Here is the reason." She produced a letter which she held out to him. "All my life I've been living on promises. I have waited and waited . . . all in vain. He never comes. He never comes. He loves me. Oh, I could never doubt that. He loves me, but he never comes." There was a break in her voice, her eyes brimmed and overflowed. "Read it.'
He had gone through so much during the past twenty-four hours that it seemed to Armitage that he had become dehumanized, that he was only a thinking marionette. He took the letter and opened it. For a time
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