ned quickly to Karl and held out her hands.
"He is gone. I am glad. But, Karl, I would have given a year of my life
if he had delivered my letter to you."
"Why? Tell me what you wrote," he asked eagerly.
"I wrote all the things I told you a few moments ago, Karl. You know it
all now."
She went over to the grate and looked sadly into the ashes.
"My first love letter," she said softly. "Oh, Karl, it was my confession
of my love for you. I would like to read it over again with you, and
then we might forget. I don't want to be afraid. I want to be strong, to
be happy. If I only had that letter now."
Karl took her hands in his, and comforted her.
"Never mind it, Olga; it has served its purpose. It has taught us
ourselves, our hearts."
"It has taught us that we must be strong, brave and loyal," Olga
declared warmly.
They stood thus, looking into each other's eyes, sanely, clearly, each
ready to renounce. The door of the studio opened and Millar stood before
them again, holding in his extended hand a letter.
"I beg a thousand pardons again," he said. "I find I gave Karl an old
tailor's bill instead of madam's letter."
Olga eagerly took the letter, opened it and recognized her own
handwriting.
"My letter, Karl!" she exclaimed.
Both bent close over the letter, reading it eagerly, while Millar
slipped quietly out of the studio--out of their lives. Olga looked up
from their reading.
"I am glad that I wrote it, Karl," she said. "Now we will burn it."
Together they watched it glow brightly into flame and fall into gray
ashes.
"That is our love begun and ended, Karl," Olga said quietly. "It was
wrong, and now we realize it, don't we? And now, dear boy, you are
coming with me."
"Where?" Karl asked.
"I am going to take you to Elsa," Olga answered.
With a feeling of elation, Karl called Heinrich, and was helped into his
overcoat. He bent respectfully and kissed Olga's hand as they walked out
of the studio together.
THE END
THE MORAL OF "THE DEVIL"
BY ELLA WHEELER WILCOX
Copyright, 1908, by American Journal-Examiner.
In every human organization dwell the _Twins_--the Angel and the Demon.
The Angel is the real self; the enduring, immortal self, which goes on
from life to life, from planet to planet, until it has made the circuit
and ended where it began--at the _Source_.
The Demon is man made; it belongs to the changing, perishable bodies
which are created anew with
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