New Britain herald., 1926-06-11
HER MAN .: ,:;:: ::;:::: ;::::: :::: Ha@ @@ S@~@@s&& @ @a @ s@ @@ @sG@ Wife"
 andp by
By Beatrice Burton


Iteryals when she fed the baby. changed his clothes and put hin in 10 his bed.
 Presently it was seven o'clock. Ithen half-past nine. then midnight It began to rain wildly.
 Ranny out in this storm in his thin Palm Beach suit with the girl whose initial was "M". What was she like. that girl? Small and dainty and perfumed like her handker- chief?
 The baby whimpered and Sylvia went into his room to turn him CT i his side.
 : His small hand waved in the air and fell on his mothers hand like lcaress.
 Hes sorry for me- Sylvia thought. and she leaned over the tiny thing and whispered in his ear Don't you feel sorry for your mother you little chick" she croon- ed 10 him. We just won't let our selves care--you and I, We love our ] Daddy even if he has forgotten us.' Then she strengthened up and whispered silly" to herself scorn- fully.
 If Ranny didn't love her any more--if he loved this girl who used rlue handkerchiefs-s free him. She had given him mp once before to Fay Shirley and she could give him up to this girl. She loved him too much to hold him against his will,
 CHAPTER NNNI Toward one o'clock Sylvia decided that she might just as well go to bed. It might be hours and hours before Ranny came home.
 She was cold and sleepy besides, and there was nothing to do but hang up his wet clothes 10 dry when he did come. She could get up and do that in two minutes, for the sound of his key in the door would be sure to waken her. in case she did fall asleep.
 Hours before she had turned down Ranny's bed and laid his clean paiamas over the foot of it. Now she put a hot-water bottle between the sheets before she lay down ill her own bed.
 Shcaiways did these comfortable little things for Ranny. She got his bath ready for him every morning of her life. put the buttons and links in his shirts. pressed his neckties- waited on him hand, foot finger. She considered that part of her job as wife.
 But I've failed somewhere in this marriage business" she told herself as she lay with closed eyes, every nerve taut as she waited for Ranny to come home. T haven't kept him happy and contented. or he wouldn't be out now with some other wom- an" So she reproached herself. Perhaps she wasn't keeping her self Up. Perhaps she was losing her looks, She jumped out of bed, thrust her bare feet into her mules and went over to the mirror of the dressing table.
 She tilted her head and looked at herself sidcwise, with the finnsse of d practised 1iirt. Unconsciously, Syl- via iiittrH wifh the whole world even with herself in the mirror, now.
 Men who didn't know her never guessed that she was one-man woman. They always thought that she was making eyes at them. Per haps it was because of her long curling lashcs that swept up and down like those of the storied Becky Sharp. Or it may have been be- cause of the dimplo that flashed in and out at one corner of her mouth.
 But whatever it was, Sylvia was entrancing to look at. She looked like anything but a neglected wife deserted wife-just now as she studied herself in the long mirror of the dressing table.
 I But she frowned at the woman in the glass--the woman who didn't ! know how to hold her husbandl ! Then she picked up a powder pun and fluffed it across her face and touched up her pale cheeks with rouge.
 "Oh, you" she said aloud, throw | ing down the rouge puff angrily, "Oh, you, what's wrong with you, anyway"
 i For it never occurred to Sylvia that Fanny was to blame for their marriage boat going upon the rocks as it surely was going. The fault. she was positive, must be hers.
 She figured the marriage was the woman's job. And if it failed it was the woman's fault. A successful wife had to be not only a homckeep- CT, a sweetheart, a mother, but a 1 pal as we'll
 Perhaps that's where I've fallen down." Sylvia thought, racking her brain, maybe l ought to read more and talk more. and be more enter ! taining, more peppy!" i And, moved by a sudden impulse, she went into the living room, turn i ed on all the lights and started to read the Sunday paper from begin | ming to end. She must know what was going on in the world! Shs was | getting dule and stale! l At half-past two, when she heard i the street door close quietly and 1 footsteps creak their way up the sairs, she swiftly lit a cigaret and ] crossed her bare feet on the seat of a chair opposite hers. i "rhere." she thought. now at any rate l look like Fay and the rest i of the wild women he admircs.' ] She heard him tumble with the 1 lock and then softly swear to him. self in thick uncertain voice. i She got up and opened the door ] for him and he came in.
 His clothes were sodden with rain,
 l..