Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1889-04-04

Over her mouth and finely nodded chin
the rich color lay like flame; but hel
eyes were in deep shadow, though some,
how knew-guessed from her attitude
as she sat rigidly upright, both hands
tightly claSping the arms of her low
chair-that all her soul was in them;
that, more anxiously than had done a
moment before, she was straining her
sight to solve the mystery in that dark
corner near the door.
Slowly | turned to her husband
Strangely enough he had not glanced in
her direction; he had been engaged in
relighting his cigar, which, in the heat
of discussion we had had moment
or was it year?-ago had gone out.
But when Beryl spoke again his at
tentiOn was also arrested, and all three
sat staring at the child, as, moving a
little further away from us, she said
patheticaliy:
"Where are you going, Mr.. Dane? O.,
wish you would not gO!" then turned,
her arms Outstretched in heart breaking
distress, her puckered face foreshadow-
ing an OutburSt of childish grief 'Oh,
mother, he is not thereI He has gone!"
Still Mrs. Anstruther never moved.
1t was George who came forward, and,
taking his daughter in his arms, strove
earnestly to comfort her, and his voice
sinkinga little, endeavCred to explain
the circumstances to me.
They have second sight in my wife's
family, and this poor mite has inherited
it, suppose. Always when death oc-
ours in the family the rest are warned
of it by supernatural appearance. But
why"
He stopped short. The suspicion
which was only forming in his mind
was, however, written clearly and con-
concisely in mine.
"Why had the spirit of Laurence
Dane appeared here, unleSs-unless-"
1t was subject for broken sentences.
dared not follow the writing to the
end.
1 stood up and tried to speak of some-
thing, of anything that would Danish
this sense of tragedy from our midst;
but even as l struggled to make an or
dinary remark Anstruther's servant
came in with a telegram, which he hand
ed to his master.
Hastily it was torn open, then allow
ed to flutter to the ground.
ut is as l feared; Laurence Dane is
dead, Nora"
There was no reply. To Mrs. An
struther had mercifdlly come a mo-
mentary respite from her anguish. She
had fallen forward from her chair in
dead faint, and over her prOstrate body
her little child bent and wept bitterly.
There was never any scandal, no dis |
graceful denouement in the Divorce I
Court; only after that night George An |
never looked on the face of his /
beautiful wife again.
BY the dead she had been condemned /
and attempted to urge nothing in her /
own defense. Perhaps it was a relief to /
escape from husband she had ceased /
to love or for whom she had never cared;
in either case she meekly acquiesced in
his decision that henceforth they must |
live apart. The child was left with her
so that no opprObrium ever rested on
her name; and poor George died too
soon Che was killed out tiger shooting
with me, through daring, most no.
BILE effort to save fellow spOrtsman)
for there to have seemed anything sus-
picious in the circumstances of her sud
den home going.
She has not married again. l often
wonder whether it is from feeling of
late loyalty to her husband-the best
that woman ever won-or from
to the lover to whom she
sacrificed her fair fame and all that
should have been most dear.-LORdOn
Truth.