The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1886-07-03
SHE LOST HER FAITH.
1T WAS AN "UNcOMMONLY QUIET
AND ORDERLY NIGHT"

1T WAS AN "UNcoMMoNLY QUIET
AND ORDERLY NIGHT"
The Ways of a Lover Whose Habits We're
Not Sach as "A Maiden Wants in a
Man She Is to Tie Up to for Life.-How
She Made the Discovery.
l have young friend who has lost
most all of her faith in mas ,uline human
nature She probably still believes in her
father and brother, and of course her con
tldence in her favorite clergyman is unim-
paired; but as for the rest of the sterner sex
she thinks of it as | should dreadlully hate
TO have any one think OF Inc. But l must
| hurry to tell you Just how it all happened.
My friend Miss Flora never mind her other
nameD went to Europe about hve years ago
! TO complete musical and generally artistic
| course in Italy. As a school girl of 70 she
formed fond attachment for a
young Knickerbocker. They exchanged
| rings and, as they both thought,
their alleged hearts in the bargain.
While she was away she was great deal
more steadfast to her troth, as girls usuSally
/
she got a good many hints from friends at
home, just before she returned, that made
her doubt whether his habits were just such
as she wanted in a man she was TO tie up to
for life. The consequences was that when
she heard that she heard that her Charley
was going wrong she did something differ
ent from sitting down, as most girls would,
and having a good weep tirst she wrote
~, oil sha IuI rl nd ha nfprr inc
to lie rather than lose her and her half mil
whoever said he wasn't was liar, SO to
speak
A DARING SCHEME.
She didn't believe him, and she wrote to
me. 81 am coming home" she said, with
the most daring scheme that / ever had, and
you and your cousin Bob are in it knew
it would be something breathess, but was
hardly prepared for what it turned out to
be- She wanted to get male forgery for her
self and me, aad then have Cousin Bob to
introduce us as young foreigners to her
Charley, as she always called him. | was
like Artemus Ward during the war, per-
fectly willing to sacrifice all my wife's rela
tions, but l would not go myself. My
figure is not exactly the sort for male attire,
hair clipped and you can have Cousin Bob"
She wanted to put in night around
town with her Charlie, and, as Bob knew
him very WELL it was as easy as an old
stocking. Bob wouldn't hear of it at first
~ kick" he said IAN right said |; "kick if
you want to, but you'll either do what l
want or you don't go anywhere with me or
my friend. neat summer" We'll, he did it,
Int ha uail ba |
lived.
Flora got herself up in the style of law
student-on one OF those buttoned up things in
black, with mouth and the handle of
cane always in it, and eyeg glasses, and the
stare of a baby trying to look like an old
bachelor. She's born actress, and she
looked true to life She went with Bob and
her Charlie and half dozen others, mostly
goli-plated young snobs to see Lurles lue
Flora pretended to he just from France and
unable TO speak English, so that no nobody
tried to talk to her except Bob
AN HOUR OF wICKEDNEsS
Her plan worked to dot. She saw and
heard enough to satisfy her To use her
own words: If went to a nunnery to-
morrow I'd have had more than my share
of wickadness Just from that nj hit Every
one of the younS men, except Bob knew
some of the girls on the stage, and they
talked about them, she says, .ust As jockeys
might be supposed to talk aLout horses
One of the young men tiirted with woman
in the audience, met her after the play, and
went away to supp with her. while the
rest stroled to an all night chop house on
Sixth avenue Flora stool it there just one
hour She drank Rhine wine, to which she
is accustomed, but the conversation of the
young men, tue stories they told and the
way they behaved with the mattresses who
attended them caused her to beg Bob to
take her home He told me that he had
been wanting to do that from tle first
1t was nothing extraordinary, said he
in fact, it was an uncommonly quiet and
orderly night the boys were having, but
they talked freely, and although | should
have thought nothing of 1T ordinarily, still
when knew that a sweet and innocent girl
was listener and looker-on there suffered
such torture as | never did before i'll my
life 1t gave me a new view OF life, and
ever since then have been half ashamed of
myself in feminine company"
As for Flora, can't tell you what she
said She came and flung herself on my
bed and cried, the next day, till | thought
SHE WOulu "cSp hSiooh sf"HJ' bOaHs"
and "brutes' were the only words she could
find to apply to her companions of the night
before, and she assured me that in all the
French novels all the criminal reports and
all the startling talk she had ever read or
heard she had never conceived tenth OF
the perfectly awful horribleness of these
young men.
TO CAP THE CLIMAX.
Well, that Is not ALL There Is more to
Flora's case, and in fact, / come in here my.
self. Flora wrote to her Charley, telling
him that she was the French student who
spent that evening with him He tried to
see her, but she said she would rather touch
a toad. Then he wrote to her that he was
far better than an average young man; IN
fact. that he was rather a model-sooer,
honest industrious, and without being adj
dicted to any vice except smoking To cap
the climax, her own people took his side,
and she has had assurances that he is an I'M
commonly nice young man from whom do
you Think Why, from two clergymen,
| from cousin Bob, from great retormer
from college professor, from banker and
| from male relatives a score in number
Flora is disheartened and Disguised She
has not given up the SEX She means to
| find some decent, clean, manly, self respect