d, "after all!"

I gently urged him to proceed.

"Pshaw!" said he, after kindling his cigar with a few vigorous whiffs,
"what's the use of being foolish? My aunt was never diffident about
telling her story, and why should I hesitate to tell mine? The young
lady's name,--we'll call her simply Margaret. She was a blonde, with
hazel eyes and dark hair. Perhaps you never heard of a blonde with
hazel eyes and dark hair? She was the only one I ever saw; and there
was the finest contrast imaginable between her fair, fresh complexion,
and her superb tresses and delicately-traced eyebrows. She was
certainly lovely, if not handsome; and--such eyes! It was an event in
one's life, Sir, just to look through those luminous windows into her
soul. That could not happen every day, be sure! Sometimes for weeks
she kept them turned from me, the ivory shutters half-closed, or the
mystic curtains of reserve drawn within; then, again, when I was
tortured with unsatisfied yearnings, and almost ready to despair, she
would suddenly turn them upon me, the shutters thrown wide, the
curtains away, and a flood of radiance streaming forth, that filled me
so full of light and gladness, that I had no shadowy nook left in me
for a doubt to hide in. She must have been conscious of this power of
expression. She used it so sparingly, and, it seemed to me, artfully!
But I always forgave her when she did use it, and cherished resentment
only when she did not.

"Margaret was shy and proud; I could never completely win her
confidence; but I knew, I knew well at last, that her heart was
mine. And a deep, tender, woman's heart it was, too, despite her
reserve. Without many words, we understood each other, and
so----Pshaw!" said Westwood, "my cigar is out!"

"On with the story!"

"Well, we had our lovers' quarrels, of course. Singular, what foolish
children love makes of us!--rendering us sensitive, jealous, exacting,
in the superlative degree. I am sure, we were both amiable and
forbearing towards all the world besides; but, for the powerful reason
that we loved, we were bound to misinterpret words, looks, and
actions, and wound each other on every convenient occasion. I was
pained by her attentions to others, or perhaps by an apparent
preference of a book or a bouquet to me. Retaliation on my part and
quiet persistence on hers continued to estrange us, until I generally
ended by conceding everything, and pleading for one word of kindness,
to end my mise