The daily Alaskan., 1907-05-20
What Sic Taught Him
TOHeInaI1

ters Of love and a man should deal with them according to their own methods. Donovan was stationed at ! Fort Monroe, where he studied at i the artillery school by day and alrted with the girls at the hotels during the ! ven,ug
 1 Among other girls be saw a great | deal of LOrella Bertrand, the daugh-
 ter of a retired army officer living in 1 Washington. Miss Bertrand was quite
 young and very unsopblstIcated. Cap tain Donovan was the first grown man
 who had ever been especially attentive to her and her poor little head was
 soon turned. He was her constant at | tendaut at dress parade in the after
 noon and In the evening was always l seen sitting In one of the luxurious chairs opposite her at the hotel where she was staying with her parents. ] Then one day came Mss Olc0tt a l New York belle, and whlsked most of the young officers Of the fort in her 1 following, as a train Of cars will draw papers on the track flying In the air ! after 1t. Captain Donovan at once be- came the favorite, and he made no
 more of transferring his attentions from Miss Bertrand to Mss OlcOtt
 than of changing his uniform of khaki to full dress. Poor Miss Bertrand met her first attention and her first deser- ton very near together, but if the lat ter troubled her she did not show it. OutwarGly at least she accepted the situation. and, as she was just grow Ing into attraCtveness, she found no difficulty In filling up her time with
 other officers.
 From Fort Monroe Captain Don ovan was ordered to the Pacific coast He remained there three years, when
 he was transferred to the war depart meut at Washington. On the evening of hls arrival at a reception Of the sec retary ot war he met Mss Bertrand. Three years had filled out her figure and stamped beauty On her face. She was the same retiring, gentle creature
 chat she had been when Donovan had
 first met her, and when he approached and spoke to her, after a slight appar rnt embarrassment, she received him not uukindly. As Donovan surveyed her critically from head to foot he re gretted that he had not taken her when she was ready to fall Into his net However, not being troubled with back
 wardneSs. he manufactured cock ano bull story about his conduct limiting at excuses greatly to his credit, and asked permission to call and explain. Miss Bertrand told him that she would be at church the next Wednesday, aft eruoon at 4 o'clock and he might seq her there.
 Donovan went from the reception to the Army and Navy club, where he met Major Price, with whom he had passed some time ID the Philippines when they were both subalterns. They sat down together at a table for re- freshment and Donovan, who was at the moment full of his former love. spoke to Price Of having met her Price smoked in silence while Donovan gave him an account of his attentions to Miss Bertrand. his switching off to fol low Mss couldn't help It; she was such a sumner and ended by telling of the appointment between himself and Miss Bertrand the next afternoon.
 "Oh, she wouldn't hurt any ones feel ings for the world" said Price. She's a lovely girl and has recently inherited fortune from Der grandmother"
 The two officers parted with eLpres- sIons of satisfaction at having met aft CT so long an absence, and the next afternoon at 4 o'clock Donovan went to the trysting place. The street before the church was filled with carriages
 which surprised the captain, who could not understand how so many people would attend service on a week day Then, seeing a canopy stretched from
 the sidewalk to the church door, hp concluded that some friend of Mss Bertrand was to be- married and this and not the ordinary service was what had brought her to church.
 He had scarcely entered when @
 wedding march came rolling out from the organ. Who should Donovan ser proceeding as the groom down a sldp aisle but hIs friend Major Price As
 founded, be turned to the correspond
 Ing aisle opposite, and hls wonder was tenfold at seeing in the bride the lady be had come to meet, Miss Bertrand
 Donovan was entering a pew at the moment and caught at It's back to steady himself. In a twinkling he saw
 himself from being about to be lifted Into heaven cast down Into hell Hp
 stoOT during the wedding service sup porting himself on the back of the pew
 In front of him. and when the bride and groom walked out through the center aisle, passing within a few feet
 of him, he stared at the bride like a condemned man at bis eZecutIOner. But she mercifully kept her eyes to the front.
 Captain Donovan went to bis rooms
 sadder and a wiser man. He had hirted with women who had vented upon him the wrath Of q woman scOrn- ed. Their treatment had only fiattered