El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1915-01-22
Dorothy Dix's Absorbing Series
: Why My Wife Left Me :
The Husband Who Flirted With Another Woman Tells
LIZ Stnr,r
His Story.
By DOROTHY DIX.

women the most money and the fewest
attentions.
"Of course I had many flirtations,
and I remember that cynical old
bachelor uncle used to say to me, with
a chuckle: Watch out, Jimmiei Some
day one of these near-engagements OF
yours is going to end fatally for you
in matrimony' And it did.
He Meets the Woman.
81 met a girl who was everything
that I Wasn't-a grave, solemn, serious
woman with ewes that were like great
ptols Of tenderness: a wonderful Wom-
an. all strength and steadiness, to
whom love was a holy thing, a name
not even to be taken lightly on your
lips. She was beautiful and fine, and
ir my heart I worshipped her as man
worships his patron saint
I'VE were married, and for years
we were perfectly happy, for ] was
absorbed in wonder and reverence OF
this new love that had come into my
life, and that was so much higher than
anything / had ever known AND then
by degrees I grew accustomed to IL,
as 7 suppose a man would grow &C
customed to having the kohinoor II
he happened to possess it,
''Then. at some party or other that
We happened to go to, 7 met a little
fluffy-ruffle sort Of a woman, one or
the pretty pert gay little buccaneers
that sail the social seas in quest OF ad-
ventures. They are daring little pirates
and they like nothing else so well as
to capture some staid merchant ship
Of married man and hear him OH
right under the guns of his wife,s eyes.
IT was easy prevail the easier be-
cause for so long my weapons had been
out Of the fight. I had forgotten shat
my tongue was ever nimble at flatter-
ies-that 7 had ever quoted poetry eff
fectively; that I had ever sighed un-
utterable nothings. I had thought Of
my destinations as gone. I had come
to consider myself as done with ro-
nance.
He Thinks He Is n Romeo.
"God knows how some women do It.
but here, in an instant, / saw myselI
in this woman's eyes no longer as a
middle aged, perfectly domesticated
husband and father, but as an allur-
ing Romeo, and it went to my head.
Before I knew it. without intending
it, without meaning it. 1 was en-
barked on one of those flirtations
that almost invariably end in disaster
and prove the truth of the old adage
that their is no fool like an old fool
Let me do the woman the justice to
say that she, no more than I, intended
any real harm. We really attracted
each other because we were both ex-
perts in the love game. and in each
other found fOemen worthy of our
steel It was match o. wits instead
OF nGaILr OF FENCING instead o. AGtAiliE-
But we played the game according
to Hoyle. There were flowers and can
dy. and rides. and little dinners in
quiet restaurants. and strolls through
the park at night, and notes sadly
sweet, breathing of a hopeless passion.
And all, I swear it, meaning nothing
from either her or me.
In my heart I was never untrue to
my wife. I knew this other woman
for the foolish, vain, frivolous little
creature that she was, and in the very
moment that I was entreating her TO
go out to dinner with me. or autOmo-
bile with me, 7 was thinking in the
back of my heart. and thanking God
for it. that my wife was not Of that
tempt her to treat me as I was Undue
ing this other woman to treat her hus-
band Also. incredible as it sounds. by
the very froth OF this filtration I meas
ured the depth Of my love for my wife.
"I never intended, of course, that my
wife should know of this silly affair,
but one day she found in my pocket a
letter from the woman full of fond and
spurious endearments, and making an
for rendezvous that was
really innocent, but that damned me in
her eyes. I tried to explain to her that
/ was not in love with the other won
an or she with me. but her loyalty
was not OF the kind that could COM
prehend that kind of faithtulness.
Women love altogether. or not at all.
They are true as steel or false as per-
diuon, and that is why they never can
comprehend how a man may love and
honor his wife in his inmost soul and
stin let his fancy occasionally wander.
''And so my wife did, as doubtless I
should have done under the same cir
cumstances. She left me and I lost the
steady sun of love for a light Of love.