[The Merry Men by Robert Louis Stevenson]@TWC D-Link bookThe Merry Men CHAPTER III 139/162
They were not words that came to her, they were sounds more beautiful than speech, infinitely touching, infinitely tender; and yet as I lay there, a thought stung to my heart, a thought wounded me like a sword, a thought, like a worm in a flower, profaned the holiness of my love.
Yes, they were beautiful sounds, and they were inspired by human tenderness; but was their beauty human? All day I lay there.
For a long time the cries of that nameless female thing, as she struggled with her half-witted whelp, resounded through the house, and pierced me with despairing sorrow and disgust.
They were the death-cry of my love; my love was murdered; was not only dead, but an offence to me; and yet, think as I pleased, feel as I must, it still swelled within me like a storm of sweetness, and my heart melted at her looks and touch.
This horror that had sprung out, this doubt upon Olalla, this savage and bestial strain that ran not only through the whole behaviour of her family, but found a place in the very foundations and story of our love--though it appalled, though it shocked and sickened me, was yet not of power to break the knot of my infatuation. When the cries had ceased, there came a scraping at the door, by which I knew Felipe was without; and Olalla went and spoke to him--I know not what.
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