The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-11-06
LETTERS OF
TWO WOMEN
Kate Osway, Spinster, to May Bond,
Wife.
BY ZOE BECKLEY.

new OTkg July
Your letter did me heaps of good.
Whether followed your advice or not
it is balm to my torn heart. 1 had
almost come to think that whatever
we longed for was bad for us-from
lobster to love affairs! Perhaps you
are right that whatever brings us
the greatest power for service is the
thing to reach out for.
Nevertheless, 1 am still harassed
and miserable. 1 have seen neither
Paul nor c. ]. for more than a week.
Paul has gone on his western trip.
c. ]. is i'll and has not left the club
where he lives for some days. You
will snap your fingers and say
"Poohi OF course he'd go and get
sick over it-just to worry you the
more!" But 1 think it is unfeigned.
affair.
1 had a short note from Paul say
ing he had not given up, and never
| should But that he kept to the
| schedule of his trip to give me a
| chance to find myself
81 hope the other man will do as
much--keep out of sight and hearing
until you have sufficient time and
peace to read your own heart" he
writes what your heart says shall
make me ever let go of you-when
| you love me no more or less than an
other. Take your own good time to
| search your heart, and them will
| do the rest
| 1 don't know what he means by the
rest, Maizie, and 1 am too tired to
| think. 1 believe 1 care for this man
| tremendously, May. And yet, para
| doxical as it sounds, 1 shrink from
marrying him. The quality about
him that attracts me is the very
| quality that repels me at the same
i time. 1t was his "foreignness'' that
| first made me notice him. There
was the element of the unknown
| about him. 1t was an adventure
| just to know a human being who had
| been born on the other side of the
| earth, in some strange, half-civilized
| town in south Russia. 1 know moth
| ing of his people or his home All I
know is. that his parents are dead
and ne has brother in, the 1ipio-
matte service. I didn't particularly
care to know. I liked the mystery.
But to marry him frightens me!
don't know why. It seems like
going into a strange country where
! you don't speak the language and
| don't know the customs and have no
way of escaping if you feel you must
How can one be attracted and re-
| PEELED at the same time by the same
| thing?
w nat a cnance marriage isl I
really believe Shaw Is right-that il
| all the names of women were put
| into one sack and all the mems into
| another and were drawn out by twos
| and put together for marriage it would
| be just as safe way of finding mate
| as the way we go about it under the
| present system.
You were so sure about Curtis dear
And yet what is this strain of disaD-
| pointment that is creeping into your
| letters? Why is the gloss rubbing
| off,? What a brute 1 am to keep
writing you my troubles and never
asking to find out if you have any of
your owni Tell me what they are, if
only to help me avoid similar ones
| oh, Maize. darling, wouldn't it be
/ wonderful if we could only learn
more about person before we marry
! them? Their habits when not on dress
! parade. The care they take towards
| neatness. Whether they snore or not
| And keep their wardrobes tidy
| Whether they like fresh air at night
What sort of tooth powder they use
and if they are subject to colds in the
| head. Their preference for flannel
underwear and their tolerance of
garlic in the salad dressing. And a
| thousand other things that are each
| capable of wrecking marriage.
While I am il this state of sus-
| pended animation. so to say. write me
| all about yourself. For 1 am ever
/ your most interested and devoted.
| KATE.