Meade County news. [volume] (Meade, Kan.) 1900-1918, 1904-04-14
By A. ST. JOHN ADCOCK.

Edmund Dolby went home from the
city that evening by an earlier train
than usual, and Mrs. Dolby was out.
He had been uneasy in his mind all
day, for the night before he and Lefty
had quarreled, and it was because this
had been fretting him and he was
wistful of making his peace with her
that he had contrived to get home so
much earlier than usual. And now
| she was out.
The facts in connection with that
quarrel were, briefly, these: Edmund's
one particular friend in Watford was
Alfred Hilbert, and Letty's one par
ticular friend was Nelly Hilbert, his
wife. Once week the Do1bys went
round the corner and spent an even
ing with the HilDerts, and once week
the Hilberts came round the corner
and spent an evening with the Dolbys
There had been a time when Alfred
hilbert was desperately in love with
Lefty. Twice she had rejected him,
when Edmund made her acquaintance,
and they fell in. love with each other
at sight.
Alfred resigned himself to the inev-
table SO completely that a few
months later, being breezy young
man whose heart was too we'll season
ed to break easily, he transferred his
affections to Nelly, who was already
Letty's dearest friend and had remain
CT SO ever since
Edmund knew all about this from
the beginning. Alfred treated it as
jest. After they were all married, he
would speak of his past infatuation as
openly at their weekly meetings and
laugh about it, never seeming to real
lie that nobody enjoyed the joke but
himself.
Instead of growing Injured to his
facetious descriptions of his extinct
passion, Edmund more and more re-
sented them, even rebuking Lefty now
and then, as if she were to blame for
having been passively responsible for
Alfred's fascination.
Last night, after the Hilberts were
gone, he had rebuked her with unrea-
sonable irritation, for he was of a nat
urally jealous temperament, and had
gradually persuaded himself that AL
fred was much too attentive to his
wife, and that Letty's manner toward
him was unnecessarily gracious.
Lefty was disposed at the outset to
answer him laughingly. but her flip
pancy exasperated him. Finally he so
lost control of himself that his pre-
posterous hints and innuendos stung
and insulted her.
Her cold dignity was unabated by
breakfast time this morning, and as
he could not humble himself and sur
render, he had gone off to the city sui
lenly, without kissing her.
Away from her, he remembered all
her sweetness, and was ashamed that
his jealousy could so outrageously be-
fool him.
He had pictured it all wildly; he
had fastened home to fulfil his happy
imaginings-and she was out.
There was piece of crumpled paper
lying in the fender. He had noticed it
idly, directly he sat down, and now,
suddenly, seeing there was writing on
it, he picked it up, Strengthened It
out, and read it:
Have got the tickets. Be at my
Office not later IMAM Z, and we will go.
Till death and after, Alfred"
He sat stunned, rereading it me-
chanically, as if it meant nothing to
him. Gradually the words seemed to
burn into his brain.
He started to his feet and snatched |
his watch from his pocket. A quar-
ter past six. There was bare posi- |
bility that he might even yet be in |
time to intercept them, and he must |
make the most of that.
AS he passed the Hilberts' door a |
vaguely forlorn hope tempted him