It is no arrogance to say
that I am become a pure woman; not my own merits, but love of you
has made me so. I love you as a woman loves only once; if you asked
me to give up my life to prove it, I am capable of doing no less a
thing than that. Flesh and spirit I lay before you--all yours; do
you still think the offering unworthy?"
And yet she knew that she could never thus speak to him; her
humility was too great. At moments she might feel this glow of
conscious virtue, but for the most part the weight of all the past
was so heavy upon her.
Fortunately, her time did not long remain unoccupied. As her
grandfather's heiress she found herself owner of the East-end
property, and, as soon as it was assured that she would incur no
danger, she went over the houses in the company of the builder whom
Abraham had chosen to carry out his proposed restorations. The
improvements were proceeded with at once, greatly to the
astonishment of the tenants, to whom such changes inevitably
suggested increase of rent. These fears Ida did her best to dispel.
Dressed in the simplest possible way, and with that kind, quiet
manner which was natural to her, she went about from room to room,
and did her best to become intimately acquainted with the woman-kind
of the Lane and the Court.
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