Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1907-11-14
A DOMESTIC SKETCH
By Yeln1a Caldwell Melville.

T5OAI6LuLA5 n " % Sui Lit 5L@4 Ecu II
though he stoutly affirmed that
did,, and I answered a trife sharply
lie said something eIge-Harry has
Ghe gift Ct sarcasm. l replied hotly;
and so it went on until he left the
house the picture of injured innocence
and ( wiped my hands, out of the dish
water, on my clean apron and sat
down for a good cry-at least for a
large CRY. After half n hour or more
Of this indulgence, my heart was no
less sore and my head ached wretch
eddy. The worse felt the more firmly
I became convinced that Harry was a
cruel husband; that his love for me
If indeed he had ever had any, which
I declared to myself / doubted-was
dead; that my marriage was failure
and nay life a wreck.
] say we he'd not actually quarreIed
but Of late these unpleasant scenes
were becoming alarmingIy frequent,
and it was not always that l recovered
ny good humor sufficiently to be any
more than frgidly polite when he
all signs Of i'll temper banished by con-
tact with Jolly wOrd-came home
20 dinner. / remembered, too with a
paug, that several times he had lapsed
into my mood almost Immediately and
gone Off with out a word I was
vaguely alarmed, but none the less
positive that my husband was more
chan two-thirds at fault, and that my
naturally sweet temper was ruined by
being trcOmpatibiy mated These
we're the very words that I used to my
self. I cried again over the dishes,
thinking Of how happy l had been in
the cid times wheE Harry wooed and
Won me; and then I grew homesick
Tor mother and the girls, and ended by
declaring alOud-there was no one to
near but Dick, the bird and General,
the cat-that l wished I had had sense
enough to remain single like Nell and
LHe, THE girls" aforesaid, o, me!
well 1t was q sad, improbable morn
ing Just before noon a little spasm
Of sOmething-it was not repentance,
Tor the sinned against can not repent
came over me, and I said aloud again:
Il will do my duty, let come what will,
It is woman's lot to suffer alone and
die by inches"
SO Z went to work to get W parti-
cularly appetizing dinner, feeling quite.
virtuOus as again I recalled the scene
of the morning in all it's details. Then
a new thought struck me as my poor
head throbbed anew It was only fair
that Harry should know What
martyr I was making of myself; so
Just before 1 expected him I arranged
my hair as becomingly as possible and
then adjusted a white head band
wrung from cold water 1t really
cooled my head and did me a world of
good, but not quite in the way I had
planned In imagination I beheld my
hunsband's face grow tender when he
saw that I was i'll, and the look of
genuine TemOTse when he noticed how
I had had a care for him through it
all
But he did not come. The tempting
dinner cooled untasted One o'clock,
5wO, and then a bare-foOted urchin
brought me a note from Harry saying
he had had to lunch at a restaurant in
orded to keep an engagement with
man.
Down I flung myself, the feeling of
uneasiness that had possessed me
giving place to a variety of sensations,
chiefly however hunger and anger.
And this was the end of my martyr
Il h1
never know that I had tried to please
him: and then it all came to me so
plainly, the difference in our lives,
Z had spent the fornoon in thinking OF
bim and him alone. My whole world
rovolyed around him; he made my
sunshine or shadow: he held my very
existence as a mere toy in his hand.
aud held is o, how lightly.
With him, when he departed in the
morning, he left not thinking of me
1T ALL He entered another world
where there were pleasures, business,
companionship. a thousand things to
entertain and occupy. While was
planning the things he liked to eat he
was engrossed in other matters, and
when dinner time came he simply ig-
uored me and my efforts and to accom-
MEDIATE some 'man. "-dined at a res
taurant He knew I would be uneasey
and probably go without my meal-if
ne remembered me at all. If any of
you have had an experience similar to
mine you know that the more I indul-
ged in this strain the more my head
ached, and the more my head ached, the
harder I cried. There was no wearing
the cold compress just for show or
effect now.
And then, after about on hour Of
this, the door bell rang, not the front
bell either else I would have feigned
not to hear it but the side door bell.
7 must respond.
With despairing glance mot 2 mir
TOR I slowly opened the door. trying
meanwhile to fabricate a plausible
story fearing the head ache would not
he enough.
0. Mr.. Raymond what a plight you've
caught me in," I fairly sobbed out, as
admitted our new minister. I say
new for he had only been with us p
half year, vet in that time we hal
learned to love. almost reverence him
He was Iarga fine looking man. With