Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1898-02-10

she opened it, her eyes fell by chance
on few lines of hopeless yet musical
melancholy, which. like a sad song
heard suddenly. made her throat swell
with rising yet restrained tears. They
ran thus
"Oh! I can drown, or, like broken
Tyre
Be thrown to earth. or cast upon fire,
can be made to feel the pangs OF
death.
And yet be constant to the quest OF
BREATH
Our poor pale trick of living through
the lies
We name Existence when that some
| thing dies
Which we call Honor Many and many
way
Can be struck or fretted night or day
In some new fashion,-or condemn'd
the while
To take for food the semblance of a
smile,-
The left-of rapture of slain caress,--"
Ah!-she caught her breath sobbingly,
THE left-off rapture of slain caress!"
Yes,-that would be her portion now II
If she stayed to receive it. But she
would not stay! She turned over the
volume abstractedly, scarcely conscious
of the action,-and suddenly, as if the
poet-writer of it had been present to
probe her soul and make her Utmost
thoughts public, she read
Because l am unlov'd of thee today,
And undesired as seaweeds in the seal"
Yes!-that was the because" OF
everything that swayed her sorrowful
irit,-"because" she was "unlove'd
and undesired."
She hesitated no longer, but shut the
book with her farewell letter inside it.
and put it back in it's former place on
the little table beside Philips arm
chair. Then she considered how she
should distinguish it by some mark
that should attract her husbands at
tention toward it,-and loosening from
her neck thin gold chain on which
suspended small diamond cross with
the names Phillip" and "Thelma" en-
graved at the back, she twisted 1t round
the little book, and left it so that the
sparkle of the jewels should be seen
distinctly on the cover. Now was
there anything more to be done? She
Invested herself of all her valuable or
naments, keeping only her wedding
ring and its companion circlet of bril-
liants,-she emptied her purse of all
money save that which was absolutely
necessary for her journey-then she
put on her hat, and began to fasten her
long cloak slowly, for her fingers were
icy cold and trembling very strangely.
Stay-there was her husbands por-
trait,-she might take that, she
thought, with sort of touching timid-
ty. 1t was miniature on ivory-and
had been painted expressly for her,
she placed it inside her dress, against
her bosom.
"He has been too good to me-" she
murmured; land / have been too hap
py,-happier than l deserved to be.
Excess of happiness must always end
in sorrow"
She looked dreamily at Philips empty
chair-in fancy she could see his ia
miliar figure seated there, and she
sighed as she thought of the face she
loved so well,-the passion of his eyes,
the tenderness of his smile. Softly
she kissed the place where his head
had rested,-then turned resolutely
away.
She was giving up everything, she
thought, to another woman,--but then
that other woman, however incred-
ible it seemed, was the one Philip loved
best,-his own written words were a
proof of this. There was no choice,
therefore,-his pleasure was her first
consideration,-eve must yield
to that, SO she imagined her own life
was nothing, in her estimation, COM
pared to his desire. Such devotion as
hers was of course absurd-it amount
ed to weak self-immolation, and would
certainly be accounted as supremely
foolish by most women who have hus-
bands. and who, when they swear to
convenient opportunity-but Thelma
could not alter her strange nature, and.
/. with her, obedience meant the extreme
letter of the law of utter submission.
/ Leaving the room she had so lately
called her own, she passed into the en-
trance hall. Morris was not there, and
she did not summon him,-she opened
The street-door for herself, and shut
ting it quietly behind her she stood
alone in the cold street, where the fog
had now grown so dense that the lamp
posts were scarcely visible. She walk
ed on for few PAGES rather bewildered
and chilled by the piercing bitterness
of the air,-then, rallying her forces.
she hailed a passing cab, and told the
man to take her to the Charing Cross
Station. She was not familiar with
london-and Charing Cross was the
only great railway terminus she could
just then think of.
To be Continued.