THE NEGLECTED WIFE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3348, 15 May 1918, Page 58

THE NEGLECTED WIFE.

Ey Eve "Buetherton

(Copyright.)

The neglected -wife was running away—running away with the other man into a beautiful world of romance, full of flywers and sunshine and all sorts of other things with charming names. Her pretty face was pale; she had a curious trembly feeling about the knees; but her lips were set in a straight line of determination, and it was with determination that she drew down the blind—shutting out the dying light of the November afternoon, —turned up the gas, and set about making her preparations. As she moved round the pretty room -which she and the neglectful husband had furnished together hardly a year ago, she told herself that he would thoroughly deserve what he was going to get. Would he miss her, she wondered, pausing an instant in her occupations. No—her face hardened —his work was enough for him! Why, for the last month she had scarcely 6een him.

It was too bad 1 Not for this had she married! True, he had warned her that a doctor's life was a busy and exacting one, but never had she thought that things could be as they were. Work, work, work, morning, noon, and night—yes, night, too, for of late he had even taken to sleeping downstairs in the surgery, because he said the night calls were so frequent and would spoil her rest. Absurd! If he had really minded he could have made some arrangement, got someone to help him or something. And in the rare moments they spent together he was grave, preoccupied, took no interest in the things that interested her. Oh! it was unbearable!

She lashed herself into fury, still moving about her task. What did he care for her work? It'was his own that was so important. He hardly knew that she had any work. What was her pretty talent for writing, to him? He seldom had time for more' than an indulgently smiling glance over the graceful trifles of verse which some day were to make a book and their author's name at the same time—the other man had said so.

As a matter of fact there was nothing in them to read otherwise than with smiling indulgence, ' for in all her butterfly days the poor, pretty little neglected wife had never once seen life as it is. But this she did not know. And the other man was, perhaps, more complimentary than truthful. How about this bracelet, these earrings, Tings, and brooches? She should like to take them.' with her. They were all gifts from the neglectful husband, it is true, and—did wives who were "running away" take their husband's presents with them? She did not know.

The bracelet he had bought her in the Palais Royal when they were on their brief honeymoon in Paris. It had cost more than he could afford, but as he clasped it on her wrist he had said tenderly that she was worth the expenditure. Ah I she -was in those days! These earrings, sparkling on their velvet bed, were bought out of the earning of his fir,st big case after their marriage—they had not been cheap. This brooch was a birthday present—her birthday; this pendant another—his birthday. These trifles marked other days here and there, the last not. so very far behind her. She sighed and returned the things to the jtwel-case on the table. No. She decided that wives did not take their jewels when they left the giver.

Tucked away among other belongings she came upon a copy of Tennyson. That, too. had been her husband's gift during their engagement. She turned the rapidly. Why, how he had pencil -marked linen here and there ! She had forgotten that! He must" have been fonder of poetry than she had thought—it was a loving hand that made those marks. Well, perhaps he was—of other people's. Not of hers! Hers was nothing to him. She hardened herself again, and put the book back amongst the things that must be left behind. Soon want of appreciation and neglect Mould be left behind, too. Sho would be with someone who could understand and admire her, love her as she deserved to be loved, see her as she was. A iter all, it was only a handbag that »he could take with her now. The other man had said that he would buy her all ehe needed. And later—when the big step was taken—no doubt the rest would be sent to her. The big step ! What would it feel like to have taken it ? But it grew late. No more time must be wasted. She took clown a dark costume, dark furs, a dark hat and veil. Dark-coloured things seemed suitable for a wife who was running away. They undoubtedly were the proper wear. She donned the clothes, fastening them with fingers which had begun to tremble in a most unaccountable mariner, regarding herself in the glass meanwhile with tragically widened Slufl eyes.

Now all was done. One last look round, ind then—to make the plunge.

But as she took the last look, a sound in the hall downstairs made her start. Had someone thrust the latchkey in? Yes: the outer door shut with a bang, a voice called her name, quick footsteps sounded on the stairs, and her husband was in the room/

"We've savod her, Ruby!" he said excitedly; "-we've saved her. She'll live, thank God! And thank God the strain is over! But we have won." Ho pushed the hair off his forehead with a gesture of relief. # "What—what do you mean? Who \rill live?" the girl stammered, her brain workin? desperately for a way out of the trap in which she found herself. Who would liavo dreamt of his returning at this hour --the first timo for weeks and jnonths?

! "The easel told you of, child! Surely you've not forgotten ? The case I've been so desperately anxious q,bout this last month. Lord! but I have had a time of it. Over and over again I thought she was slipping through our fingers, and I believe it would have broken my heart if she had. But she's safe now. She was such a pretty young thing before her illness, so gay—she reminded me of you, and that was one reason why " He broke off and drew back, seeing she was not listening. " Sorry, little woman," he concluded. "I shouldn't talk shop, should I? But I'm a bit beside myself. Forgive me. Are you going out?" "Yes," she said, hardly knowing what she did say. " I'm going to the Cliffords." But the lie nurt her, for she was not a bad woman—only a vain and foolish one. Hi,9 [face .fell. " Must you go? I hoped you would be at home. I've got an evening off. Colquhoun is back again; going to look after his own patients and mine, too, for once. It's such a long time since we've had an evening together. Can't you stay?" he asked wistfully. But his words only helped her to rally resentment to her aid. "No," she answered bitterly. "I can't stay. I'm going out. It is not my fault that "we've not had evenings together. Day after day I spend mine alone, and you never even ask how I spend them. And when you do come in, all you think of is your patients. I don't count. I've had more than enough of it!" She turned away and began moving blindly about the room again. He looked at her dazedly for a few moments. Then: "You are unjust!" he said; turned slowly from her, and went downstairs. Five minutes later she also stole down, hand-bag in hand, and out into the raw murk of the evening. The sitting room door was ajar as she passed, and she saw him sitting there alone. His face seemed to have grown older and sterner than it used to be. A taxi paseed her as she stood hesitating on the pavement outside. Should she take it ? No! Taxi-cabs carried one so—fast. Ah! a hansom—that would be better! , As the cab jingled away with her she took a letter from her bosom, longing hungrily for the familiar thrill with which letters in this handwriting had never failed to supply her hitherto. Their writer was a master of his craft. Hie charmingly artificial prose and gracefully fantastic poetry had made' him something of a celebrity in his own section of the literary -world. But for once he failed to hit the mark. Tne little runaway wife, searching for the thrill which should bring her comfort, searched in vain to-night; searched in vain amongst the faultlessly perfect sentences and tuneful phrases for something—something which an obtrusively insistent thought told her had been in the rough, unpolished lines of other letters, received a year ago —short rugged letters burning with the white fire of a strong man's love. Her eyes, fell on the lines, "So, my bird, my little singer of sweet songs, we will take flight from this land of gloom, and somewhere, far from its cloudy shores, build a nest together beneath Southern skies!" Only a few hours ago these very words had filled her foolish little soul with ecstasy. Now, they seemed a trifle vague—unsatisfying. Somehow, the " building of a nest beneath Southern skies" seemed to her at this moment a thing less desirable than the going back into an ordinary homely room "in the "land of gloom," where a tired man was sitting lonely and dull, brooding over a fire which he was almost certainly letting go out. Ah! There ahead glittered the lights of the station. How near they were! The other man would be awaiting her there.

Suddenly her hand shot up; the trap flew open. " I—l think I'll get down here," she gasped. She left the amazed driver looking wonderinglv at just double his proper fare, crossed the road, and in five minutes' time was hurrying* back over the way she had come, as fast as the fastest taxi would take her. The latch-key was still in her pocket. She slipped it in, crept lightly through the hall—the sitting room door was shut now—upstairs to her room. How strangely unchanged it looked—considering that a century had passed since a silly woman had left it and started off on the road to—what? But the silly woman had come back—come back home. ■She unpacked the little bag with impatient hands, hiding: it .away. She tore off the suitably dark garment?, put on her daintiest house frock, combed out her curly hair, fastened the sparkling earriricrs into her little pink ears. Then she went down. He was still sittinsr where she had left him. The room looked cheerless, and, as she had expected, the fire needed attention. He was gazing into its dull embers listlessly, the book he had been reading lying beside him, face downwards on the floor. Ho did not look up as she opened the door, but w-hen a bright little vision passed him to go down on its knees, hearth brush in hand, between him and the forgotten fire, his whole face changed. "Cbildie! You!" he exclnimed. "I thought- it was one of the maids. You've come back —I am glad! What happened?" "Nothing—nothing hnppened," she said rather breathlessly: "I insf —came back. I thought you would' be lonely—and—and cross—and —and T knew you'd—let the fire out—and " But tears were splashing on the hearthbrush and the shovel, and the fire was not setting made up properly after all. So the neglectful husband leant forward and drew the neglected wife up bodily into his arms. "Look here, little woman," he said, " you and I have been going the wrong

way to work lately, and it's got to be different. I've been seeing it all since you said what you did just now. I've been a thoughtietss brute, very likely, wrapped up m my own profession. But you haven't troubled as you might to enter into the difficulties or understand what the strain of it is sometimes. We've been drifting towards shipwreck, dear; but there's not going to be any shipwreck if my wife will help me steer. See, little one. Will you help me steer?" " Oh, I will, I will; yes, I will," ehe sobbed hysterically, winding her arms tightly round his neck, and wondering whether she would ever have the courage to tell him how very near they had been to the shipwreck of which he spoke. And it was not until a maid came in to lay the table for dinner that the fire (which really was neglected) got the attention it needed. But on the following day the wife who was not neglected had another kind of fire, attended to by nobody but herself. And in it, she burnt, besides a great many beautifully expressed letters full of exquisite sentiments, a quantity of poems not Tennyson's.