The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-09-10
BROKEN WEBS.
BY H. FORREST. Copyright, 1905, by Daily Story Pub fishing Col

BY H. FORREST.
 Copyright, 1905, by Daily Story Pub
 fishing Co.)
 It is the sunlit garden that I hate. Strange. isn't 1t? But whenever see the dew on the roses and the wet leaves sparkling in the brilliant morn ing light, a fierce resentment sweeps through mo that the world is so beau tiful for others and so draggled and dusty for me.
 I look out of my window now and see, stretched in shimmering delicate ness from one rose bush to another, a cob-web. A sheer intricate thing it is, and that very fact arouaes within me the long smouldering fires of hatred. desire and loathing. I rise and jerk down the heavy blinds. so that no rays of the golden sunshine shall enter my den, and sitting before my desk, dream again of my lost youth.
 Tn spite of the curtain a fine shaft of light steals in and falls across the small painting above my desk, so that the young beautiful face shines out through the gloom. The rich warm hair lightens up, and the eyes are dusky, with little diamond point of light in their depths. The smile on the rose lips seems to deepen, and I sit gazing like fool at the picture long to destroy and yet cannot.
 When I first met her she was only a girl, ever so much younger than I. Af- ter a very short while we were mar ried, with none of that romance which they say young people love. It was her fathers wish, and she was an obedient girl. I suppose she really did care a little at first. At any rate the early part of our married life was very happy in a lazy. dreamy way. She lived in her garden, and I in my den. ls, laden with flowers, not half so fresh as her own sweet self and these she would arrange about the room after throwing back the shades and letting in the cool morning air, so that the old room was filled with sunshine
 She was always laughing, too. and even now I imagine I hear the faint ring of her laughter in the dim corri- dors. I found out afterwards that she happy For a long time she used to beg me to 'come garden" with he z, but I would shake my head. kiss her and go back to my books. So after a while she ceased to ask me and I missed her childish pleadlngs while the silence of the great place irritated me. One morning, however, before I started my work, I walked out into her garden with her She was less talkative than usual, and the pink on her cheek had deepened into soft crimson The dew was everywhere, sparkling and flashing in a tho lsand tints; the flow- CTS were nodding together in brave arr ray, and the birds were splashing in the fountain.
 ran, each hedged with tall bushes and vines, so that they were dark with only an occasional splotch of sunlight
 Let us go down enc of these" I suggested, lifting an armful of roses from the grass where she had lain the choicest as she cut them for my den.
 "No,' she said suddenly. "It is all Heinrich. Let us go down one of the others"
 True. across the entrance of the path was stretched a large but fine cobweb, which had caught in its meshes drops of rainbow dew. in such a way that 1t shone gorgeously in the light.
 There is only one." I said. q will break it down"
 No. mo-" she cried. 'It Is so beauti- full. Please leave it, dear, dear Hcin- rich!'
 Aad so we went down another path. and 9 few moments later I was buried deep among my books with the music cf her singing coming through the open window.
 By evening the web was broken, and we Sauntered SlOWly uOWn the path, she chatting gaily while I watched the glow of the waning light on her siIken hair and softly rounded cheek.
 Avis" I burst out unexpectedly, "I love you"
 I mumbled 1t clumsily enough, but it seemed to me to be the right thing to say.
 Love meT' She laughed lightly, a1- though her eyes were grave. Love
 ha1 anything but those stupid old booksr'
 You know" began brokenlv. hurt to the quick. then I stopped heIplesslv.
 Tt Is not so much that yeu do not love me" she said in a low yet dis tinct voice, but you love them more
 A lot unreasonable feeling of anger swept over me, but when l saw the pretty. half-pathetic droop on her lIns I realized that she craved attention as a child craves petting-that a little love was as wine to famished person. She had seemed happy. though she had lack ed nothing she desired. What move was necessary?