Page:Aurora Leigh a Poem.djvu/181

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AURORA LEIGH.
Or some glass pin,—they have their weight with girls.
And Romney sought her many days and weeks:He sifted all the refuse of the town,Explored the trains, enquired among the ships,And felt the country through from end to end;No Marian!—Though I hinted what I knew,—A friend of his had reasons of her ownFor throwing back the match—he would not hear:The lady had been ailing ever since,The shock had harmed her. Something in his toneRepressed me; something in me shamed my doubtTo a sigh, repressed too. He went on to sayThat, putting questions where his Marian lodged,He found she had received for visitors,Besides himself and Lady WaldemarAnd, that once, me—a dubious woman dressedBeyond us both. The rings upon her handsHad dazed the children when she threw them pence.'She wore her bonnet as the queen might hers,To show the crown,' they said,—'a scarlet crownOf roses that had never been in bud.'
When Romney told me that,—for now and thenHe came to tell me how the search advanced,His voice dropped: I bent forward for the rest:The woman had been with her, it appeared,At first from week to week, then day by day,And last, 'twas sure . .I looked upon the ground
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