Windham County reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1901-1906, 1903-12-11

wife alone two or three times, though
as yet she had apparently discovered
no acquaintance at Shepherds. These
Withdrawals were to repair the fatigue
Of travel by supplanting the wine at
dinner with more potent if smaller
drafts. Besides his absence of desire
to supply his wife with any other COM
| panionship than his own, the perfume
tory character Of Mr.. Bonvale's atten-
tons attested no tender solicitude to
make himself as agreeable as possible.
He seemed to guard rather than pro-
tect his wife.
Later on Baldwin felt the young
wife's artlessly rowing gaze veering In
his direction. He considerably alb
| stracted his own. When he let his
glance drift her way again, thinking
she would have passed him by, he was
momentarily flattered to find her eyes
fixed on him dreamily. Almost at the
moment her husband turned and, with
what Baldwin thought a tactless quick
ness, let his own eyes follow the direc-
ton Of his wifes to ascertain the OBJ
ject Of her regard. With still less tact
he brought his thin lips tightly togeth-
er, and his white forehead puckered
like peevish child's. He must have
intimated to the lady his desire to
withdraw, for he brusquely rose and
looked about with the repellent air
with which some people insinuate their
exclusiveness. She got up at once and
followed him from the room with
graceful Difference.
HE seems to like to stalk ahead and
let his woman trail after him a Ia the
aboriginal lords of crea ton" reflected
Baldwin with somewhat contemptu-
GUS smile. "The honeymoon is dwin-
ding to crescent, l fancy, and /
should not wonder If there were Bon
vale impaled on it's horns before long
But which,"
The Bonvales spent six weeks in
Egypt. Mrs. Bonvale had that oriental
sojourn in her memory ever after with
something of the feeling with which
the children of Israel may have revert
ed to their bondage In that land. She
had little expected in a region saturat- |
ed with antiquity to make acquaintance
with anything so modern as Jealous
husband. Hers was dawning on her in
that light. She could not flatter herself
that the suspicious vigilance of her
ma trimonial lord was the distorted ex-
preston of a too engrossed affection.
She realized it as the selfish greed for
absolute domination which is compati-
Bile with the narrowest of natures.
Compared to this degrading jealousy,
which she quickly came to rate as ma
lignant her husbands tendency to
stimulants, which also cropped out dur
ing this stay in Cairo. seemed almost
forgivable. Yet drink produced in Luz
Glen Bonvale that dry, insolent irrita-
bility which is one of its unpleasantest
effects.
As Clarice Bonvale's eager young
soul rebelled under the scourge of this
double revelation dull mist seemed
to obscure the effulgent radiance of the
orient, and an iron thorn pricked
through its sensuous Incidence. She
was a soft innocent, ignorant young
thing. capable of heaven only knew
what possibilities. Until now rose
leaves had strewn her way through
life, and homage to her wonderful
beauty had been a stimulating incense
to her brain if not to her heart. She
had always had her mother hitherto.
Now she had only her husband. That
she should so phrase it to herself filled
her with a childljke shrinking and de-
spair. Never before had her soul known
this helpless loneliness. 1t is desc
lating thing for proud. ardent young
wife 10 learn that she has married a
stranger who, as her husband. is rapid
ly becoming a bereaving acquaintance.
There was a dumb cry in her rs
for some touch of human sympaS+y,
for the soothing support which anec- '
ton exhales. This poignant isolation
was enhanced by her surroundings I
The gayety of the hotel people; the SUI I
perficial splendor, almost nakedness. of &
the orients color; the melancholy of the
tombs, mournful memorials of a hui I
man kind associated with so remote ,
mast as 10 be merged in the mythical; I
The stolid insensibility of the sitting fg- I
ures in the many shops of the great q
hazaar. from which drifted perfumes s
sensuous, but poorly invigo-
-ating; even the thin, penetrating cry
If the muezzins, perched like human
,torks on the slender minarets ana IN
fling the Moslem to mechanical devo-