Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1923-09-13
CHAPTER XIV
Conflicting Emotions

TN amazement Lorry began to analyze
herself Was she happy now? Was
- this, then, the goal of all womanhood,
this becoming mother? Again and again
| she forced hersel flo think of Tom, but in
vain did she try to bring back that ache
| that she had always Felt whenever he
! slipped into her thoughts. 1t was gone,
! she felt nothing of it now. 1t had disap-
peared, she felt no more emotion where Tom
was concerned than if she had never known
him.
II can't understand it," Lorry said to
herself over and over. What is the matter
with me? Didn't [ ever love Tom and if
not why was l ever so miserable over him ?''
Carefully she analysed the emotion of his
presence had always evoked to her, trying
to understand it step by step. 1t had been
largely characterized by strange yearning
She had loved the feeling of his arms around
her, she had fel tat peace with him, and a
serenity had settled her whenever she
was with. him.
Always in. the past she had suddered
away from stronger feeling. When Coralie
had become engaged to Jim, and had shown
her love for him in a breathless radiance
of flushing cheeks and dropping lashes,
Lorry had puzzled over love so different
from any that she ha dever experienced.
She had preferred the gentle emotion that
Tom had stirred in her, she had always
rebelled agains tthe heat of passion, the in
Sistent driving demand that had been de-
picted in that book under discussion the
year before. She had thought her love for
Tom the most beautiful thing in the world,
but it was gone, she no longer felt it!
And then suddenly her cheeks famed.
Was it gone? Didn't she feel very much
the same kind of love for her baby? The
thought was breath-taking Was it posi-
Bile that all along her love for Tom had
been largely maternal? Wasn't that the
reason it had brought her such peaceful
contentment and wasn't it possible that it
had vanished because the baby had usurped
Toms place in her heart?
Lorry was sitting curled up in the living
room bordering on these things when the
telephone rang peremptorily and she went
TO answer it. The brusque 'hello'' on the
other end of the wire sent the blood in a
rush to her heart. She felt strange faint
ness and sagging in her knee that had
Deen Dllsstully missing from her life for
time but her voice as she answered was
quite steady, even though the hand that
held the receiver to her ear trembIed visibIy.
III you are well enough to see me for
d e., lew minutes, Courtney's voice went on,
IL run IN this evening. Please feel that
want to make everything as easy as posi-
Die for you, and it won't take long to ar
range things Satisfactorily
mere was a cold finality IN his voice
that was strangely disheartening but Lorry
put 1t down to the fact that she didn't want
thlngs arranged she wanted to go on drift
Ing; and was averse to facing facts and
a nidi declslons, and yet that wasn't pos
SlDle and she knew it.
very WELL" she answered stiffly as she
might nave spoken to any stranger 81
snail be al home"
Then she hung up the receiver and ran
to the baby. She was suddenly possessed
WIN perfect fever of desire to forget the
ordeal that was ahead of her. to forget for
tlme that things were going to be very
unpleasant and that it was going to be
very difficult to tell Courtney that of
course, he must realize the mistake thew
nau made in marrying and that freedom
Luz oother OF them was the only way out.
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