The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-11-22
LIE I TIERS OF
TWO WOMEN
Maize Writes of Obtaining Love IN
der False PretenseS
BY ZOE BECKLEY.
KerryviIle. Kan. Tue

You have a new friend, Kitsie
dear! 1t is Mrs Kane, my neighbor,
about whom 1 wrote you a while back
the lovely, brave, unhappy little wo-
man from the east I've scraped a
friendship with. l read her your last
letter. When we came to your SEN
tence:
"a man is a good husband or a bad
one, according to the type of man he
is not the type of woman you are,'
Bessie Kane burst out with, True!
Dear heaven, how true it is, 1 wish 1
knew your Kitsie"
And then she told me.
MY husband" she said, in the
tense voice habitual with her, lis of
the hon tanner type. He regards every
one in the universe who differs from
him as something to be disciplined
and brought into subsection.
He has succeeded with nearly ev-
cry one. His business associates, his
political friends. his family, his chill
dren. Everybody but me. And 1 ap-
pear to be conquered. But 1 am only
waiting"
For what % asked, for she seems
to have everything beautiful home
They're the richest people around
herel: health, good looks and three
beautiful children. I'm the only per-
son here who knows Bessie Kane is
unhappy. And 1 never really knew
why before.
For my children not to need me
any more, she answered in a Sort of
Whisper: Il have endured twenty
years of whip crac king and discipline
ana punishment The life cut here
simply maddens me. That's whv he
brought me here. oh, yes, 1 know il
was partly business. He has prot,ertv
mere. But SO he has in the cast We
o of Just as well live there. Plenty
OF men do that much to make their
wives happy. Edward doesn't believe
IN people being happy. He has done
tnlngs to discipline and thwart me
from the first days of our marriage ;,
I asked MIN
All, that's just it, dear, He didn't
let me drea moi his real nature when
married him. He dealt in false nra.
lenses from the start, Do You sun
pose l ever would have married If T
!iao known | must give up everything
the city?" AS'
above all. the city! I hate the
country. I loothe these western plains.
love life and gayety, theaters. shops,
the contact of my fellow human beings
and their complex problems.
And SO did he seem TO. He prom
1sed me home in the city near nv
people. He promised mo opportuni-
ties for life and the development of
my talents. He played his part well.
He convinced me, poor and lacking
in chances as I had been, that life
was opening richly and that our tastes
and ambitions were the samet
He married me absolutely under
false pretenses May" she went on bit
terly There is punishment in law
for a man who obtains money under
false pretenses. There seems none for
the man who'gets a woman's love and
life that way. Except" she added
what punishment the woman herself
metes out to him"
Bessie Kane is the sweetest, most
amiab1e, most reasonable woman in
the world. Katie. Yet I have heard
her husband call her impossible to
please" You are right, my dear. If
a mans determined to think you're
all right. you are-to him. And if
he's determined to see you the other
way, it doesn't make a bit of differ
ence how sweet YOU are or how cap
able or how charming. He sees you
according to his type. Not yours
I'm not feeling a bit we'll dear. but
it'll all be over soon and then I'll be
the happiest mortal alive. J love YOU.
MAIZE.