The sound of my voice seemed to startle her into consciousness.
She suddenly drew herself away from me and rose to her feet.
"I must submit, Marian, as well as I can," she said. "My new life
has its hard duties, and one of them begins to-day."
As she spoke she went to a side-table near the window, on which
her sketching materials were placed, gathered them together
carefully, and put them in a drawer of her cabinet. She locked
the drawer and brought the key to me.
"I must part from everything that reminds me of him," she said.
"Keep the key wherever you please--I shall never want it again."
Before I could say a word she had turned away to her book-case,
and had taken from it the album that contained Walter Hartright's
drawings. She hesitated for a moment, holding the little volume
fondly in her hands--then lifted it to her lips and kissed it.
"Oh, Laura! Laura!" I said, not angrily, not reprovingly--with
nothing but sorrow in my voice, and nothing but sorrow in my
heart.
"It is the last time, Marian," she pleaded. "I am bidding it
good-bye for ever."
She laid the book on the table and drew out the comb that fastened
her hair. It fell, in its matchless beauty, over her back and
shoulders, and dropped round her, far below her waist.
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