Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1912-08-02
The Gates of Silence
By Meta Smmfns, Author of FLUSHED Up
TODAY'S INSTALLMENT.

He paused and the servant with pre-
uminary cough broke into the silence.
IF you please sir" he said, the lady
has already called several times without
an appointment and has never been able
to see YOU
AS a rule. Dr. Merton was somewhat
intolerant of interruption, fact of which
experience had made the servant aware.
though it had not succeeded in breaking
what was an inveterate habit. This
morning however, the doctor looked up at
the man with interest.
rs that so, indeed?" he said, and his
tone was reflective rather than inter
roga tory
Then, almost as though he had forgot
ten his previous words, he added:
VIII See Her.
Il shall see no one after Mrs. Bar
rIngton this morning, Tyson"
The servant left the room For an in
slant the master stood staring at the fire
Then. with an abrupt change of manner,
he went quickly out of the study, and,
humming tune, ran up the stairs three
at a time, with the agility of school
boy and knocked at the door of his wife's
room
The woman, who was writing letters at
little oak bureau. set in the angle be
tween the fireplace and the window,
sprang up to meet him.
'Oh. Bob. l was afraid you had for
gotten" she said, and there was just
touch OF querulousness in her voice,
despite its sweetness
"Forgotten?" The doctor bent over her
and took her in his arms. Forgotten
my Sduirrel?" His lips rested for an
instant on her hair. Robert Merton and
his wife had been married for nearly a
year, and they were lovers still
Il have been writing to father" Mrs.
Merton said. He is coming to town
isn't It delightful? OF course I have
asked him to come here.
There was a faint movement, as though
she raised her head to glance at her
husbands face but Merton's head was
still bent over hers.
''Of course" he murmured. quickly, and
the tone, though lacking nothing in cor
diality would have sounded forced to
any other listeners ears. "Of course you
did Squirrel"
But even while he spoke, over his wife $
head his eyes sought out and rested on
one of the photographs on the mantel-
niece beyond-a panel length photograph
in a silver frame representing a cleric
IN full canonicals a man hard featured
and self satisfied looking, in whose I'M
pleasing face there was yet an unnis-
taxable resemblance to the woman at his
side.
"Oh, Bob-how dear you areI And I
can say you would write, only-well, Of
course I'm here to write for you! But
you understand, don't you. how sensitive
he is?"
"Of course" said Merton again But he
felt a grim desire to laugh He disliked
his father law almost as much as he
loved his wife, and that was saying
a good deal, and in his unbiased opinion
the Rev. Harold Beauchamp was as SEN
sitive in disposition as was an elephant
in its skin.
He was almost glad when tho striking
of the clock warned him he must go
downstairs. The thought Of Canon Beau
champs approaching VISIT had added to
the depression that seemed this morning
to hang about him like a cloud.
Run away, now. beloved. Nouldnt
keep you here q moment from your won
derfu work. Healer-peaoe bringer!
Loving W1fO-
She repeated the last words under her
breath as she stood alone, then went
back to her desk. The mirror that
hung above 1t reflected her face for a
moment, wrapt in ineffable content, dark
eyes radiant with love and trust Then
the small head bent over the paper again
and the flying hand wrote:
my husband is. AS ever. dear father,
the mos6 wonderful gift God ever gave to
q woman-strong. gentle in the fullest
and truest sense of the words; can say
a man without fear and without re-
preach"
Yet even at that moment, downstairs in
the pleasant consulting room, the man of
whom she wrote was listening with a less
than perfunctory interest to the COM
plants and symptoms of his first patient,
a hypo- chrondriao OF the first water, see
ing all the time on the horizon OF the flu
ture that little cloud of fear no bigger
than a mans hand which had started up
at the sight Of a woman's name written
in his consulting book. growing momen-
tarily greater.
You must positively promise to give up
doctor4ng yourself. Miss Grieve, If you
expect me to attend to your case,
he said THAT. in fact is my advice in
nutshell-a rigid abstinence from the
awful Joys OF the local chemist and his
sugar coated pills that our paternal gov
eminent makes 1t easy for the nervous