New Britain herald., 1926-06-30


 away from the house, too. And Aunt Agony was still waiting for her to return to the telephone. probably.
 But, somehow, Sylvia couldn't stir from the room. She wanted to stay here where she was hidden from eyeryone-and from eyeryone's pity and curiosity.
 She felt that she could never so out and face the world again.
 It wasn't only that she was hurt to her very soul. She was ashamed, ! too.
 She was ashamed as only a wom- an who isn't wanted, can be asham- cd. A woman who has given her whole capital of beauty, and love and devotion to man-and he has trampled them under foot.
 She had given Fanny everything she had and 1t wasn't enough. He wanted somebody else.
 She had failed as a wife. Here was the brutal little note as proof of it. He wanted to be rid of her. He was sick and tired of her. She stood In the middle of the room, looking down at the piece ot paper. Then, slowly, she began to sink down, until she was a heap of misery on the floor, her head bowed into her hands. She felt as if she never would be able to lift her head again.
 Downstairs she heard the door bell ring. and then the sound of Mother Phelps car going away. The telephone was making the pe- culiar growing sound that it makes when someone has left the receiver off the hook,
 But still Sylvia sat there, with her head down in her hands. In the palm of one of them was crushed the note-a damp little wad. now.
 Presently, the door bell rang again, and again, and again.
 Probably the dry cleaner calling for Ranny's suits" Sylvi tahought, but she did not move. The door bell rang twice more and then was silent
 After a couple of minutes some little stones battered smartly against the windows of the room where she sat. Then another shower of them came.
 She got up then and looked out
 Aunt Agony. with her hat on one side. and anger burning in her sal low cheeks, stood out on the rain- soaked driveway.
 It was she who had been throw ing the gravel al the windows. She had a handful of 1t in her gloved hand now.
 Her lips moved rapidly as she looked up and saw Sylvia standing at the window. Sle motioned for her to come downstairs and open the front door.
 My stars! I thought you were dead when you didn't come back to the telephone!" she cried. as she stepped into the house. The first thing she did was to put the re- ceiver back on the hook with bang.
 What happened to you. anyway" she asked, anCcily. "I stood there, that telephone for about ten minutes, and then gave the baby her milk anyway. The idea Of trying to feed a baby by the clock! It's all new-fangled nonsense any way-when I'm taking care of a baby I feed it when it's hungry, and if you don't like it, you can lump it"
 If she had bothered to look at Sylvia she would have seen that she was paying no attention to her. The eyes looked through her and beyond her.
 "Rannys left me" Sylvia said quietly, and held out the crumpled little note.
 "What?" Aunt Agonys voice was half a whisper and half shriek What"
 She took the piece Of paper into the living room and smoothed out it's creases, on the top of Sylyia's little tsa table. Then, holding it close to her eyes, she read 1t.
 "Just the sort of trick I knew he'd play," she remarked disgustedly, when she laid it down. If he were half a man he'd have come and told you he was going, instead of sneak ing off like this!'
 She was looking at Sylvia with great bitterness in her eyes.
 Well" she said. after a pause, 'you've brought your pigs to a fine market, haven't you? You've given that scallywag jour of the best years of your life. and now he's thrown you down, just as l always knew he would-left you with his child to support! I suppose l can take care of 1t now the rest of my life, while you go out and earn the liv- ing!"
 Sylvia was top crushed to answer her. The practical side of the thing was beyond her just now. All her mind could take in was the one dreadful fact that Fanny had left her.
 He was never going to live here with her and the baby again, in the Little White House.
 The sound of his Taube roadster, turning into the drive, would never again send thrill of joy tingling along her nerves. He would never read his morning paper in the din- ing room across the hall again never F. stretched on the davenport, with his smoking table beside him, and q book in his hand.
 "Oh. what am l going to do?" Sylvia groaned loud.
 "Do?" echoed Aunt Agony in her vincgary voice, "why, you're going to refuse to divorce him! Let him leave you. if he wants to! Let him run off to his new charmer but you don't have to divorce him. Why should you give up your dignity as a