The Washington herald., 1912-02-01
END OF ROMANCE
is ALWAYS TEARS
Unless the First Chapter Is Written
in Honor.
ny DOROTHY DIX.

ny DOROTHY DIX.
A middle-aged woman, with hair thai
was getting grizzled ana gray. with q
form that was losing its ntheness and
settling into the gauntness OF age, and q
face where the roses had faded ana the
wrinkles were coming, shot herself few
days ago before an open window through
which she could see the man she loved
with young girl who was her rival
This woman belonged TO q good family.
She was educated and refined. She had
been married and had had an honorable
place IN society, but she fell in love with
a man whom she believed to be her
affinity, and she had left all that a wom-
an should hold dear and sacred and fol-
lowed him.
For sixteen years she had known what
is was to endure social ostracism, TO have
other women draw away theirs skirts
from her, TO know that people never
mentioned her name without teIlinE or
her shame. She had sacrificed everything
for the man and his love, and ne ana
his love were literally all that she had.
She was dependent upon him for her
happiness, as women or her kind are
upon men, and as no good woman with
blessed family ties, and friends, and chill
dren, and home ever is upon a man, even
her husband.
Sixteen years went by with the woman
living in a little cottage, a little isolated
from its neighbors, and across whose
doorsteps few visitors came. At first she
was happy-madly, riotously happy. Tne
man spent every hour in her company
that he could spare from business, and
they loudly proclaimed that the only gos-
pei was all for love, ana the world wei
lost" Then as the years went by the
man began to grow tired OF her. He dld
not come TO see her so OFTEN He was
irritable and iIl-tempered when he did
come. Rumors reached her Of his at
tcntiOns to other women.
A Pathetic Struggle.
The woman knew that his love for her
was dying, and she began that hopeless
and pathetic struggle that many
woman makes to hold a man who is
weary OF her, and TO blow into fresh
flame a passion that has burned itself
out, and that is nothing but a little pinch
Of dead ashes. She tried by all the arts
by which a desperate woman may TO
keep herself young, TO make herself look
pretty and attractive. She studied how
she might not anger him, she met his
own anger with gentleness and forgive
ness
She impIored him, with tears and pray
Prs, to come back to her, to be faithful
10 .neT. Sne TenlnOeQ MN OF al Indl
she had given up for him She pictured
to him her desolation II he left her.
But to no avail Such a man always
follows the bent of his fancy. He was
tired of the woman. A new fancy beck
oned him, and at last the woman knew
herself forsaken and deserted. She fol-
lowed him to his own home, where
pretty young girl-young enough to be
her daughter-was spending Christmas
I've with him. She looked through the
unshuttered window at the two, and then
she fired a bullet through her own heart,
and died in the snow on the doorstep of
the man whom she had once believed
to be worth the price Of her own dis
honor.
The story Of this woman's life is not
q peculiar one. Except for a few details
it is the story Of practically every mar
Tled woman who goes wrong, and for
sakes husband and home and respecta-
bility for some man of whom she is
enamored. You cannot pick up a news
paper without reading OF some such
woman, deserted by the lover for whom
she has sacrificed her honor, who has
taken a bloody revenge by killing him,
or else, in despair. committed suicide.
It is the inevitable end OF the romance
that begins so beautifully, and 1 espe-
cially commend this feature of It to those
poor, foolish women who are dalIying
they can eat stolen fruit and not find
1t dust and ashes on their lips.
The End of Romance.
The end Of the romance is always
tears and sorroW, unless its first chapter
is written in truth and honor II sounds
very anuring TO the dissatisfied mar
ried woman to tell her that she has a
right to happiness and love, and to live
her own life in her own way. It sounds
noble and beautiful for a man to tell her
that he will take her away from an un-
sympathetic life and devote the balance
Of his days to making her happy. She
may convince herself that love is the
only bond that can hold people to-
gether.
She does not foresee that in time her
life will become one mad. frantic heart
breaking EFFORT to hold a man who is
trying to get away from her, and that
with every shred Of the dignity Of her
womanhood torn into tatters and
dragged into the dust. she will be on |
her knees begging him not to forsake |
her.
Yet that is what happens. That is the
way the romance ends for ''the woman |
who dares."
Novelists and poets have filled the
minds of sentimental women with glow
ing pictures of the ecstasy OF sacrificing
everything for love. This poor creature,
who shot herself while she looked |
through the window at the man she had |
adored with her pretty young rival,
shows how this theory works out in
actual life. The novel ends when the
couple 90 away hand in hand. presum-
ably 10 realms Of unknown bliss. The
real story ends when a deserted and
broken-hearted woman commits suicide
amid the wrecks of her sin-stained life.