Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1907-07-25

you wonder why I-why you are re-
pellent to me. Haven't you learned
that, though / may have been made in
to a moral coward, I'm not a physical
coward? Don't bully and threaten.
It's useless"
l put my hand strongly on her
shoulder-taunts and jeers do not
turn me aside. What did you
mean?" / repeated.
Take your hand of me-" she COM
manded.
What did you mean?" I repeated
sternly. Don't be afraid to answer"
She was very young-so the taunt
stung her. 81 was about to tell you,"
said she, when you began to make
it impossible"
I took advantage of this to extrf-
cate myself from the awkward po-
sition in which she had put mel
took my hand from her shoulder.
II am going to leave" she an.
nounced.
"You forgot that you are my wife,"
said /.
g" am not your wife," was her an
swer, and if she had not looked so
childlike, there in the moonlight all
in white, l could not have held myself
in check, SO ~insolent was the tone and
30 helpless of ever being able to win
her did she make me feel.
"You are my wife and you will stay
here with me-" l reiterated, my brain
on fire.
II am my own, and I shall go where
l please, and do what l please" was
her contemptuous retort. "Why won't
you be reasonable? Why won't you
see how utterly unsuited w are? l
don't ask you to be a gentleman-but
lust a man, and be ashamed even to
wish to detain a woman against her
will"
/ drew up a chair so close to e
that to retreat, she was forced to sit
in the broad window-seat. Then l
seated myself. by all means, let
us be reasonable" said l. Nov, let
me explain my position. have heard
yOu anu JOul lllCAoo ulOCu0olA6 CAO
views of marriage you've just been
expressing. Their views may be
right, maybe more civilized, more
advanced than mine. No matter.
They are not mine. I hold by the
old standards-and you are my wife
mine. Do you understand" All
this as TRANQUILITY as If we were dis
cussing fair weather. "And you will
live up to the obligation which the
marriage service has put upon you"
She might have been a marble stat
ue pedestaled in that window seat.
"You married me of your own free
will-for you could have protested to
the preacher and he would have sus-
tanned you. You tacitly put certain con-
ditions on u marriage. | assented to
them. | have respected them. I
shall continue to respect them. But
when you married me, you didn't
marry a dawdling dude ~chattering
advanced ideas with his head full
of libertinism. You married a man.
And that man is your husband"
I waited, but she made no comment
not even by gesture or movement.
She simply sat, her hands ~interlaced
in her lap, her ayes straight upon
mine.
you say let us be reasonable" l
went on. well, let us be reasonable.
There may come a time when woman
can be free and independent, but
that time is a long way off yet. The
world is organized on the baisis of
every woman's having a protector
of every decent woman's having a
husband, unless she remains in the
home Of some of her blood-relations.
There may be women strong enough
to set the world at defiance. But you
are not one Of them-and you know it.
You have shown it to yourself again
and again in the last forty-eight hours.
Your bringing-up has kept you a child
In real knowledge of real life, as
distinguished from life in that fash
lonable dollhouse. II you tried to as
sert your so-called independence, you
would be the easy prey of a scound-
rel or %scoundrels. When /. who have
lived in the thick Of the fight all my
life, who have learned by many a SUR
prise and defeat never to sleep ex-
cept with the sword and gun in hand,
and one eye open--when I have been
trapped as Roebuck and Langdon
have just trapped me-what chance
would a woman like you have?"
She did not answer or change ex-
preston.
rs what l say reasonable or un.
reasonable?" I asked gently.
Reasonable - from your stand
point" she said.
She gazed out into the moonlight,
up into the sky. And at the look in
her face, the primeval savage In me
strained to close round that slender
white throat Of hers and crush and
crush until 1t had killed In her the
thought Of that other man which was
Transforming her from marble to flesh
that glowed and blood that surged. l
pushed back my chair with a sudden
noise; by the way she trembled l
gagged how tense her nerves must be.
rose and in a fairly calm tone, said:
sWe understand each other?"
eyes" she answered, "As before"
/ ignored this. Think 1t over, An
ita,v | urged-she seemed to me SO
lige a sweet, spoiled child again. |
longed to go straight at her about
that other man. stood for q moment
with Tom Langdon's name on my lips,
bot | could not trust myself. went
nu,c,r ~ nox, owr, rno,,a