Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1924-06-24

LONDON where those VINO Strayed
outside the law could be made to
talk. Mrs. Wickes should be able
to furnish very interesting informa-
ton. It was not far to Whitechapel
and London-by cable.
His mind, his brain, worked on
but now suddenly in turmoil and
misery despite all effort of his to
mold himself in check.
Polly! Polly Gray!
She loved this monster-that she
thought a man, and called her
guardian. Not the love of a maid
for lover: but with the love, the
honor, the respect and gratitude
that she would give a cherished
father.
The truth would break her heart.
The love her friends had given her,
turned to their own undoing!
The shame would be torture; the
self-degradation, the abasement
that she would know would be be-
yond the bearing. Her faith would
be shattered thing.
Locke's clenched hands lay out
spread across the table. He drew
them suddenly together and dropped
his head upon them.
And you love her." he whispered
to himself. DO You know what
that is going to mean? You did not
count on that. did you? Do you
know where that will lead? Do you
know the consequences ?"
He answered his own questions.
NO" he said numbly; Il don't
know what it is going to mean. I
know love her"
Polly Wickes. from her pillow,
stared into the darkness There
had been no thought of sleep; it
did not seem as though there ever
could be again. She had undressed
| and gone to bed-but she had done
this mechanically, because at night
| one went to bed, because she had
always gone to bed.
Not to sleep.
The tears binding her eyes, she
mad groped her way up the stairs
from the living room where she had
she had reached her room. That
| was hours and hours ago. Surely
the daylight would soon come now:
surely 1t would soon be morning.
she wanted the daylight, she want
ed the morning, because the dark
ness and the stiffness seemed to
accentuate a terrible and merci-
less sense Of isolation that had
come SO swiftly, SO suddenly into
her hfe-to overturn, to dominate,
10 stupety. to cast contemptuously
aside the dreams and thoughts
ana hopes of happiness and
contentment. And yet. though
she yearned for the morning. she
! even dreaded it more. How could
| she meet Howard Locke-at break
last? She couldn't. She wouldn't
go down to breakfast,
She was nameless.
mat phrase had come hours ago.
IL had scorched itself upon her
braln-as branding iron at white
| neat sears its imprint upon culver
ing flesh, never to be effaced, all
ways to endure. She was nameless.
| ~ WASH It that she had not always
known lt-she always had. But it
| meant now what it had never meant
pefore. Until now it had been
something that, since it must he
borne, she had striven to bear with
| what courage was hers, and. denv-
| ing ITS right to embitter life, had
| sought to imprison it in the dim re-
cesses OF her mind, but now in an
instant it had broken its bonds 10
stand forth exposed in all its ueli
ness; no longer captive, but a
NenSeful captor, claiming it's miser
aple right from now on to control
anu Illuminate ner life
She had thought of love-it would
rave been unnatural if she had
| not. But she had never loved ami
therefore she had thought of II oniV
IN an abstract way. Dream love
iancies. But she loved now-she
ioFed TINS man who had so sudden
~ come into her life-she loved
Howard Locke. And happiness
greater than she had realized hap
plness could ever be, had unfolded
Itself to her gaze. and love had he
come a vibrant. personal thing. so
wonderful, so tender and so glad a
thlhg' that beside it all the world
was niue and insignificant and
empty but even as the glory of il
ana ana the JOY. of it had burst upon
her. she had been obliged to urn
away from it-not very brayelv. for
the tears had scalded her az She
mad run from the living room-be-
cause there was no other thing to
90. because 1t was something thar
vas not hers to have.
she could never be the wife of
any man. u
She was nameless.
why had she ever found It outo
IL might so easily have been that
she would have never known. That
mat no one need ever have
known. She was sure that even
her guardian did not know.
She smothered her face deeper IN
the pillow as she cried out In
anguish. She could have had han
plness then and-and it would
nave been honorable for her to have
taken 1t, wouldn't it?
She lay quiet for little while.
No; that was cowardly, selfish. IF
she really loved this man, she
should be glad for his sake that she
knew the truth, glad now Of the
day when she had found it out. She
remembered that day. 1t seemed to
live more wildly before her now
than it ever had before. Mrs.
Wickes-her mother-had-had been
drinking. The words had been a
slip of the tongue. a slip that her
mother, owing to her condition at
the time. had not even been con-
scious Of. Mrs. Wickes had been
garrulously recounting some sordid
crime that had remained famous
even among its many fellows in
Whitechapel, and, in placing the
date. had stated 1t was two years
after Mr.. Wickes had died Later
on, in the same garrulous account,
she had again referred to the date.
~~(/ y