The Hardin tribune-herald. [volume] (Hardin, Mont.) 1925-1973, 1934-10-12

, IT hope your room will be neat" sale
| Mrs. Porter, q little disconnected. I
sure he'll want to see it."
"Well," said James, show long Is ne
going to stay?"
"Just to lunch, this time"
"wer, If he had an airplane he'd get
here in about fifteen minutes. You can
60 about a hundred miles an hour"
He turned back to his writing, In the
sitting tent, and Mrs. Porter stood ioa
a time, hoping he would say something
more
"what are you writing, dear?" she
asked presently.
%, nothing!" said James, hastily
"Just some writing"
She turned away then, heavy-heart-
ed.
'They do-shut me out" she thought
TITS no use my trying to deny It. O1
course, I know they're fond OF me
but some children simply adore their
mothers"
She went to look at her sweet peas
for solace. They were really wonder
full, those sweet peas; people passing
along the back road stopped to look at
them; they were every color, dark wine
red, purple, mauve, the palest pink
She bent over them, inhaling their
delicate fragrance, touching the fragile
petals with her finger.
II won't be silly" she told herself
They're only children. It's not fair to
expect too much"
She returned to the house, told An
nette that Pete would also be with them
for lunch, and then went to the sitting
room to begin her practicing.
She was at the piano when her hus-
band mounted the steps; the ardent
brilliance of a Chopin mazurka muffled
the sound of the doorbell, and she did
not know he had come until the piece
was finished and he spoke.
Hello, Lydia!"
She turned a little pale, and rose
holding out her hand.
Hello, Stephen!" she answered.
It was strange, it was dreadful, that
at the sight of him the happy good will
she had felt while reading his letter
should so utterly vanish, that she
should, in spite of herself, remember all
the old, bitter things.
you're too damned serious!" he had
told her once, and she felt that he was
thinking that now. She imagined how
she must appear to him; a slender
young woman with brown hair and
grave, gray eyes, pretty, but lacking in
style, a little colorless. He had never
taken any interest in her music, her
studying; he had never attempted to
share her love for good books, her de-
light in a garden.
"And I did try!" she thought. IT took
an interest in all his business affairs.
I always welcomed his friends. I was
always willing to go to those stupid
night clubs with him, and those tire
some, vulgar musical comedies"
She remembered her last birthday,
less than a year ago. Stephen had pro-
posed taking her out to dinner and q
play-and he had got tickets for the
show he wanted to see. It was not Of
ten she lost her temper, but that had
exasperated her too greatly, that pre-
tense that the evening was for her
pleasure.
"You must have learned by this time,
how I hate those revues!" she had cried.
"You need something to make you
laugh" he had answered.
But he had changed the tickets, and
they had gone to see a wonderful play
that had moved her to tears. At the
end Of the second act she had turned,
meaning to thank him nicely, but she
had found him preparing to go out.
1--WE got to go out and have a
smoke" he had said, land a breath of
fresh air-if I want to keep awake till
the end"
So it had been in everything. And.
in April, the end of her endurance had
come. A new building was going up OPP
posite the house where they lived;
when she opened the windows on the
bright spring mornings there was only
the maddening noise of a riveter, dust,
clamor, ugliness. Stephen had not car
ed how she felt about it; he had ex-
pected her to stay there until July, and
then go to a big, noisy hotel at the sea-
side.
II cant-live this way any longer,
Stephen" she had told him one eve
ming. There's no use in our trying to
60 on"
She had thought that often enough,
but she had not quite meant to say it