The Montgomery advertiser., 1902-04-11
THE ADVERTISERS
 DAILY SHORT STORY

lifted her face toward the dark window,
 where the mans hands clasped the bars
 And after that she was motionless ten
 twenty. forty miautes-as long as stooe
 looking at her. So still she was, so mo
 tionless, so dumb, that it seemed to mt
 that I was not looking at life, but al
 some master painting.
 | When I returned to my rooms at noon
 l glanced idly out of my window mo
 ment at the white masses of slow-mov'
 ing clouds in the wonderful blue of the
 sky. Then my vision falling back to earth
 rested upon black spot in the street
 the woman was still there. standing | erect. slender. silent, motionless. Ihe child lay asleep at her feet. a white | bundle in the dust.
 | Her eyes were turned upward, but the 1 mans fingers were not visible on the l bars at tho window.
 Since then. whenever I glance out the
 window, l see her there in the .,,h111 middle | against the reckoning sky; at noon pit l iful shadow under the midday bright
 ness; at evening black spot in the l gloom of the twilight
 | and the world is against him.
 Day after day she is there. Some
 times she sits prone in the dust; some l times she leans wearily against post; ] always is her face turned upward at the mans fingers claspng the iron bars. | And always is the child with her, silent | and mOtlOnleSS as nefS6f. l I wish she would go away. She makes me nervous. They say she believes her husband is innocent. That shows she is a fool.
 She is gone-that shadow that used to finger out there in the street so long as the daylight lasted. has vanished. She has started on a wild goose chase. but she has gone, and my nerves are get ting stronger again.
 1 never knew before that I was such d weakinr. But. honest. Phil. when l saw that woman standing in dumb, pa tient agony. gazing at the iron bars of her husbands cell, used to feel sorry for her.
 Her husband had a quarrel with the shecpherder over some virtuesless wo- | man, and as the sheepherder cannot be found, Mexican philosophy leads to the conclusion that he murdered him. Now. Phil. what do you think Of woman who will dispose of everything she has on earth for thirty pieces Of sil- ver and then, with her 2-year-old baby in her arms, start out alone to find sheepherder with whom her worthless husband quarreled-over another woman! And do this. Phil. to save the live of this ungrateful husband, she loves!
 When she was standing out there in the road. l used to get quite misty around the eyes but now, when l think of her tramping, tramping. tramping wearily, over the hot and dusty roads carrying her baby in her arms. always clinging to the hope that she will find that sheepherder in time to save her husband from Mexican vengeance, why, Cad. Phil, l can't sleep.
 What was it l wrote you when I first came here. about a wifes being a mis- fortune instead of blessing? l do not remember exactly what l wrote. but ] wish, Phil. you would burn that letter, if you still have it.
 Yesterday that shadow woman and her child returned man was with them. He was the sheepherder. She found him somewhere on the plains a hundred miles or so from here.
 She could scarcely walk when she got back. The soles were. worn from her shoes. and she limped But she was happy. Phil Cad! I never saw a bright CT smile on a woman's face.
 She stood out in the street. where I first saw her. the child in her arms her face turned upward toward the window and l saw the wonderful gladness in her eyes.
 Presently the door of ;he jail was opened and her husband walked ous-a free man.
 He walked straight to- where she stood motionless. awaiting him. He took the child from her arms and kissed it and set it down in the sand. Then he pushed the bonnet back from the wotnan's head placed a hand on each side of her face and kissed her again and again and again.
 And after that he took the baby in his arms. and, side by side, he and the woman walked up the street. he talking low, she crying like a child, and the baby laughing and pulling at it's fath- CTS beard.
 My Darling Wife:
 1 am leaving Hermosillo tomorrow for home. Expect me the day after you re- ceivs this.
 As it would not be pleasant for you in this wild country have decided to return north to remain permanently. | God, it is lonely here-lonely without you, dear! $"