Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1924-09-23
CHAPTER III
Choosing q Wife

lNI a storm of sobs from his daughter
4 ''You can't treat me like this y
she had cried. Il won't have it. Things
aren't the same as they were when you were
young. All the other girls do as they like,
and I'm not going to be treated as if |
were in kindergarten. You can put me I'M
der lock and key if you like, but you can't
keep me there. You'll see" And it was
with this threat that she had gone sobbing
up to bed, and Matthew had returned to his
vigil in the library.
Matthew Strong was thirty-eight and for
the last six years he had been q widower.
Robert, his son, now twelve, and Clau-
dia was seventeen. But while Robert was
not such a problem, due to the fact that
he spent his winters in school and his sum-
mers in camp, Claudia needed some to
guide her, some one to keep a restraining
hand upon her, and to some extent limit her
freedom. OF late, Matthew had thought of
marrying again. and until the night of the
Bradley dinner party, he had thought Sc
riously Of Margaret Davenport.
In a way Margaret charmed him. There
was something about her soft curves and
languid manner that challenged his. senses
He had pictured her sitting opposite him at
breakfast, waiting for him at night when he
returned from the office tired and in need
of relaxation. And then on the night of
the Bradley dinner party he had seen her in
a new light.
During dinner she had had enough wine
| 10 loosen ueF tongue, ana ner voice had
become loud and shrilI Matthew with covert
eyes fixed on her face had seen it flushed
and slightly coarse, and afterward, she and
several or the other women had danced in
| a way that was anything but dignified
/ Matthew had been standing at the end Of
| the room with two other men when one Of
them turned to him with a short laugh
! There's not much difference between the
dancing of the younger set and the per
| Torrance of their elders" he had said and
his eyes rested on Margaret as he spoke -
/ Matthews eyes followed those of the
| other man, and a surge Of disgust rose up
| in him. Margaret was, thirty-two and still
unmarried. There was something about the
way she was dancing with Richard Under
wood, an eligible bachelor, that made Mat
! thew feel that she was angling for him, de-
/ Hberately playing up her charms so as to
ensnare him. Was this the kind of woman
he wanted as a wife? Was this the kind of
woman to bring home as mother to
Claudia? And yet Margaret belonged TO the
right social set She had breeding and cuI-
ture. Had the whole world gone mad that
women of Nargaret's type could so lower
their pride as to behave this way before
other people?
Later Matthew had asked MARGARET to
dance with him. She had pressed close
against him. lifting her face so that her
breath famed his ear Matthew had felt
/ that he was merely another eligible in the
matrimonial market, and tonight as he sat
/ in the library. he realized that the Bradley
dinner party had put an end to his thoughts
/ of Margaret as 4 possible wife No he want
ed some one he could trust Some woman
who was dependable and honest. some one
in his home that would he TO him what Miss
Ah@nteR vas in his office, And then sud