Kingsbury County independent. (DeSmet, Kingsbury County, S.D.) 1894-1929, 1910-05-06
LACK OF SUNSHINE
(By Guy de Maupassant.)

cottages on the Riviera a young lady was
sitting in the warm sunlight watching the
crowd of promenaders on the beach. She
had walked only twenty steps from the
house TO the beach, and still she was al
most dead from exhaustion. Her face was
pale as death, and a terrible cough from
time to time shook her delicate body.
She smiled.
How happy I am" she whispered.
And still she knew that she must soon
die-kne'g that before the coming of the
next spring she would have been buried;
but the thought had no dread for her.
She recalled TO her memory her whole
past life. Four years ago her parents had
given her in marriage TO a tall, broad
shouldered, ~good-natured nobleman, who
owned a large estate in Normandy.
1t was all arranged by her parents. Her
feelings had never been consulted, but
the idea that she might refuse had never
| entered her mind. She was then still the
gay, light-hearted child of sunny Paris.
Her husband carried her off to his castle
in Normandy, an enormous granite build
ing with immense towers and surrounded
by a moat, standing in the midst of dark
forests.
When she arrived she had shuddered at
the sight of the cold looking building, and
said with a smile:
That does not look very gay"
"Oh, you will soon get used 10 it," her
husband had said, land you will learn to
love 1t as l do"
The next day she started to arrange
the rooms according to her taste. This
took about a month. After that the days
passed in cherries monotony.
Summer came and she went into the
fields and looked at the reapers at work
and enjoyed the bright sunshine.
Then came the fall. Her husband went
hunting. For days and weeks she never
saw him except for an occasional glimpse
at dawn, when she saw him leaving the
castle with his dogs. When he was home
he was always kind to her with the same
kindness that he gave to his horses and
dogs.
After autumn came winter, the dark,
dreary, gloomy winter Of the north. Rain,
rain and always rain! Day after day the
clouds were hanging low, always hiding
the sun, always deluging the ground with
never ceasing rain. Day after day she sat
at the window, looking out onto the
melancholy landscape, signing for a ray of
sunlight. And how cold she felt, though
great logs were burning in the immense
fireplaces. Her husband, used from boy
hood to all sorts Of weather, was always
out from morning till night, looking after
the work on his estate. 1t never occurred
to him that she might feel lonesome.
When he came home nights and they
met at the dinner table in the immense
cherries dining hall, she always greeted
him with a pleasant smile. She bore her
loneliness without a complaint.
But when December came, with snow
and ice, she could not stand the cold any
longer.
Henri" she said one night to her hus-
band, would you not get a heating stove
for my rooms, that the walls might get
dry? l feel chilled every day"
He broke out laughing.
"a heater! Why, that's a funny idea!
We never had a heater here before.
Throw some more logs on the fire, and
you will be as comfortable as l; and be-
sides it will soon be spring"
The month after that she lost her
parents in a railroad accident. She went
to Paris for the funeral, and during the
next six months she was wild with grief.
The summer sun cheered her a little, but
the summer soon passed and was followed
by a dismal autumn. Joy had gone out of
her life. She asked herself many times
why she did not put an end to her cheer
less existence. She had nothing to hope
for, nothing to live for. Her family physi-
clan had told her that she would never
have children.
Several times during the winter she
asked her husband for a heater, but he al
ways laughed at her.
One night he came home and noticed
that she mad been crying. He looked at
her n surprise when she told him that she
had felt lonely and that she longed for
sunlight and heat.
"Why, l never heard the like Of that. /
have never in my life felt lonesome. And
the idea that you feel cold is really rid.cu-
lous Imagination. You are never sick. You
have not even had a cold"
She did not reply, but went to her room
and went to bed.
So she must be sick before he would be-
lieve her. Well, then, she would just get
sick and cough until he gave her a stove.
In the middle Of the night she rose from
her bed, opened the large windows which
reached to the floor, and sat there shiver-
ing in her light nightdress for two hours,
but she could not cough. Then she got
real angry, opened the door and walked
down stairs out into the garden across the
bridge In her naked feet through the snow
as far as the woods.
Then she turned back, exhausted from
exposure, and three times she thought
that she would faint before she reached
her room and went to bed.
The next morning she coughed and was
unable to get UP. The physician was
called in and declared she had a bad at
tack Of pneumonia. She was delirious for
nan days, and talked of nothing but the
heater she wanted. Her husband drove
like a mailman to the nearest town to get
one, which he placed in her room with his
own hands.
AS he was lighting a fire in it she re-
turned TO consciousness and looked at him
smilingly.
In the meantime the doctor gave no
hope. Her lungs were ruined and her con-
dition gave rise to the gravest fear.
IF she stays here" said the physician,
1.-The frost will kill her"
Her husband sent her south. She came
to Cannes, and under the genial rays of
the Mediterranean sun she seemed to re-
vive, and she revelled In the view of the
blu ocean and inhaled with pleasure the
fragrance Of the orange blossoms. Still
she had one continuous fear that she
might recover and she dreaded to return
TO the cold and cheerless north. As soon
as she was a little better she sat at the
open window for hours dreaming about
a happiness which had never been hers.
Now, however, she knew that she was
going to die and the thought gave her a
feeling of supreme happiness. She opened
a and started to read. The first
headline which struck her was this: First
Snow In Paris" She shuddered at the