The northwestern bulletin., 1922-10-07
just Before His
Wedding
By LILY wANDEL
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS,
90 By Mcclure Nswxpan.r svna,c..

nad been very fortunate that he
mad fallen In love with Leona Sim.
mons In the first place, It pleased
his mother tremendously, for Leona
was a special friend Of the family,
greatly beloved and made much OF by
MS mother and sisters. For fully six
months before he proposed, Leona had
scarcely missed spending a weekend
with them, to say nothing of the many
dinners and parties.
In the second place, 1t was very for.
tunate for the business, because this
was sadly crippled for the lack Of new
capital. And In the third place, It was
going to make things easy for his sis
ters because Leona, as an attractive
widow, wealthy, with an assured social
position, would be sure to protege
them successfully into the right cir
cies. Truly, 1t had been fortunate that
ne, Edgar Wallace, had fallen In love
with Leona. He would be on easy
street the rest of his life, and besides
that he would have the delightful COM
panionship Of Leona. She was q little
older than he, but that was trifling.
To do Edgar justice, It must be said
that II he had not loved Leona sim
cerely he never would have asked her
to marry him. no matter how alluring
all the other details might be. 1t was
indeed fortunate that he had fallen In
love with her. he thought very often,
and not without contented, happy
smile.
1t was pleasant to see his mother
fairly brimming over with happiness,
the girls aglow with plans for the
future and to be able to see Leona
every day. Life seemed like a long
sweet dream.
A few weeks before his wedding his
mother came to him with q plan.
Il can't manage 1t alone, Edgar, it's
too much. Look at the heap Of un-
answered invitations and things on my
desk. What do you think? Can we
stretch a point and engage a social
secretary for few weeks until after
the weddingY
Edgar agreed Immediately, 1t was
q sensible thing to do.
He had forgotten about the arrange
ment when, few days later, he met
q young person In the library-a very
young thing. not more than twenty,
slim and not very tall, dark hair that
curled naturally-Leona's was straight
the pertest little red mouth and two
dark, inQuiring eyes. Edgar stared,
bowed and hurriedly left the room.
Later, Of course, he was introduced to
the new secretary.
: 1t was peculiar that during the next
few days Edgar had quite few things
to attend to In the library, where the
secretary was installed. And it was
odd, too, the interest he suddenly took
In his mothers social affairs. The In
terest grew tremendously; he had to
dictate few private letters himself
and thereby was forced to cancel an
engagement with Leona.
His personal correspondence in
creased. He wanted to get rid Of a
lot of stuff before his wedding, he told
his mother.
Then 1t happended that one day
when Miss Bowers was going for bit
of fresh air Edgar was instantly re-
minded Of a letter he had to send
special delivery and naturally they left
the house together. Edgar thought a
tramp through the park would do him
good. It was cold and there was a
thick layer of snow on the ground. A
stray little boy threw a SNOWFALL and
in two minutes they were having the
merriest time imaginable.
When, rosy, laughing and painting,
they continued their walk, he found
out her name was Josephine but that
everybody called her 10. He rather
liked that, Jo, and kept repeating 1t to
himself. so that when he left her and
took her hand, he said without think
Ing, "Good-by, little JoT"
A day or two later he confessed to
himself that he loved her desperately.
Was ever a man In such a predica- |
ment? To be married In less than two
weeks, the wedding invitations sent
out. the very honeymoon trip planned,
and then to find he loved this little
Jol Loved her so overwhelmingly
hat he could not marry Leona, no mat
ter II 1t killed the whole family.
He lay In bed at night planning des-
how to tell his mother, and
how to tell Leonal A dozen different
ways presented themselves, but by the
Tine dawn came he had rejected each
,ne and was as far with his problem
Is when he had retired.
The worst of Il was he began to
realize that his love was returned by
title 10! In her soft brown eyes was
IN unmistakable light, a wistful, coax
NC, dreamy, telltale lookl At first
IFS heart bounded with Joy and then
sank in deep despair.
Sleepless nights were telling ON him,
,e looked haggard. Luckily everybody
vas too busy to notice.
A hundred times he was at the
,erge Of throwing convention to the
Winds and simply gathering 10 to
lis heart and telling her Of his love.
,ut each time with an almost super
,vv,or oAor< he oou<~nIlaA hsrrcoY% |