The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1904-07-15
he could go to for comfort-the love and

II cannot tell her." he said "she will
hate me She only cares for those things
which must go when the crash comes.
Her indifference | can bear somehow
she will be bitterly cruel when she knows
this" and he shrank from the thought as
from a blow.
She comforted him as best she could,
with tender loving words of hope and en-
enlargement and lett him at last, to go
straight to her sister-n-law and tell her
the whole truth.
And he is worrying himself to death
not over the possible failure, but over
how YOU will take it. ! know him better
than YOU ever will, unless you learn to
love him." boldly. And tell you now
that he will never live through this unless
you help him. Maybe you can't feel
what he vvants--but YOU can-you must
pretend it" She was like tigeress
decriing her young.
The wife had been tierCely angry at the
story and the truth she had heard Now
she felt half afraid Of this young sister
who was so well championing her broth
cr's cause. And too, as she listened, some
thing stirred in her heart which she had
never felt beIore-a new tenderness for
the man who was fighting his battle
! alone i'll the den up stairs.
1t was true that she had married him
for the position he gave her. He had
done his part well, until now-and she
had never even given him the love he
cravcd. A little feeling of jealousy of this
sister who had ever tried to be, crept into
| her heart, along with the new tenderness.
81 am sorry-I did not know" she
passed. ole did not tell me-he has
kept his troubles to himself-how could
know and sympathize?"
did you ever so up to his den, as |
did, because You loved him, and your love
told you something was wrong!" de-
manded May
NO" and in the little monosyllablc
was Il whole confession.
"And when he used to come to you
in the first years-with his cares and joys
and business interests. you told him such
thin rs bored you to death-and then I'M
loaded on him all your own petty little
household worries. Do you wonder that |
he has kept things to himself since then,
and gone to his den to be alone with his |
al tIa, |
over with YOU ~
al under stand now" There was a new |
gentlrncSs i'll the wife's tone, i'll place of
the anger May had expected to hear.
Suddenly she rose.
81 am going to him." she said. and left
the room.
She, too, pushed the door of the den
noisclessly open, rs May had done. But
she saw 4 different scene. John stood at
his desk, STOPPING over an open drawer
In a moment he Strengthened up, and
raised one arm quickly. At the same in
slant She saw what that hand held-and
spranS forward with a low cry.
'John-my husband"'
The pistol dropped from his hand ash
turned and faced her HIS eyes were curl
ously bright-and there was strange,
tense look on his pale face. But she went
swiftly to him, and sweeping the fallen
weapon aside with her foot put her arms
about his neck, and kissed him again and
again.
"lohn-my lovc-my Darlington! what
does it all matter? May has told me all,
but love you. dcar-and we will be hap
pier in the future even in poverty, than
we have been in the miserable past. Tell
NE that you forgive me, John-tell me
that YOU believe ne when say that l
have found in my heart the love you ask.
cd me for five years ago"
One look into her tear-wet eyes told
him that she spoke the truth; and sud-
denly it came to him that life was sweet
after all.
But over-strained nerves can bear only
so much. There followed days which
passed into weeks, when he lay in a dark
encd room; when a word spoken ever So
softly hurt him like blow; when foot
fall was torture, Il touch or Il ray of
light agony. But hcrlove went through
it all with him, growing as the demand
upon it grew, strengthening as he slipped
farther and farther from her, among the
shadows
He came back at last-her love almost
compelled him back. While he lay help
less the business crisis came and went,
and left his fortunes untouched. So that
when he returned to health, it was also
to restored prosperity. But beyond and
above all, it was to find the love which
had awakened at the thing that did not
appen.-Waverley Magazine.