Welsh Newspapers

Search 15 million Welsh newspaper articles

Hide Articles List

20 articles on this Page

TO-l>AY'S SHORT STORY.] Dell.

News
Cite
Share

TO-l>AY'S SHORT STORY.] Dell. By HELEN MATHERS. (ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.) The girl thrust out a little naked foot, beautiful in form and colour, spanned by a tail-coloured strap, and laughed. The doctors are for ever preaching the open-air cure," she said, "urging us all about more air and light, and less clothing, yet the moment we women leave off our ha to and stockings, you men grumbler" Do you ever re;id your Bible?" said the man "You'll find in it finer rules for manners and conduct than in any book on etiquette ever written; and th-ere's a remark about a fair woman without decorum being like a jewel of gold in a pig's snout that you will do well to consider." "Oh! you mean that rubbish about our go- ing with uncovered heads to church," she said, lightly; "as if the parson oughtn't to be delignted to see us there at all! Besides, that test in the Corinthians applied to Orientals—not us. Those poor women wore a heavy veil, concealing even their features!" "Bare-headed, bare-armed, bare-footed," I said the man, "what is there to distinguish you gentlewoman nowadays from a pack of factory girls out for a spree? Heavens! If when one meets a group of you- on the sands and men's arms aren't round your waists, one feels that they ought to oo!" The girl laughed again. She was beautiful an a warm, slumbrous way, with a skin like ivory, and rich dark hair and eyes; but now she shot a quick glance at the man's face as he looked thoughfnlly out to sea. "Whose fault is it," he said—"the women who give too much, or the men who ask so little? We only demand modc-ty. decency; we don't want to share the woman we love with the whole world. There should te charms, there should be graces, jealously hidden from the world, and kept only for home consumption. In the free-and-easy, go- as-you-please manners of women towards men, of men towards women, is to be found the real reason of the failure of chivalry on the one hand, of true womanliness on the other." "Oh!" oried Lenore, with lazy scorn; "we don't faint at a mouse, and die of a migraine as our grandmothers did, if you mean that!" "But' did they?" said the man. "There must have been good stuff in those girls. physically and mentally, to make the splendid mothers they did. With our own parents went the last of the old school. Motherhood nowadays is practically a lost art. The man who wrote the line "ro suckle fools and chronicl-e. small beer' was a fool himself, and a vicious fcol at that!" "Now you are indecent!" cri-Ed the girl; yet she was not angry. He knew that she would not resent anything that he might say. His nostrils contracted disgustfully, a,s hp moved a little further from her. It had all gone so pleasantly from first to last—this untrammelled companionship of man and girl—winked at by a blind and com- plaisant world that had itself set a lax standard of morals and manners. Yet the man knew well enough that it was all wrong that. there had been no true courtship—the courtship that should be the dim, cool, frag- rant alley leading to the sacrament of mar- riage in the temple (for marriage is a sacra- ment to all true women), as it would have been to Dell, from whom Lenore had stolen him; and now he was to slip by a side wicket, as it were, into marriage, as men and girls nowadays drifted, without respect, without illusion. Lenore drew nearer, and rubbed her soft cheek against his coat-sleeve. Yes, that was how she had detached him from Dell, by giving so -much to keep him away (and Deil had given so little), and now he had come to see that modesty was the first and chief est good in a woman, modesty and a love of home and little children and beauty was of very little account when it made itself cheap. Dell's winsome, homely face seemed to him now the sweetest thing in life,as representing the sweetest things life had to give. in love, g"od repute, and honour, at that moment. He sat quite rigid-his nerves crisping in Tevolt under Lenore's unwelcome caress— knowing that he had come to the turning of the ways, that to marry this girl meant the wrecking of his future life, and that if he had not the courage to break with her now he would inevitably break with her after marriage. And as she sat watching his stern, lean face, his silence, his stillness, frightened her. i This was more than mere hufflness. Suddenly she felt danger in the air, and sat up straight. I know who it is," she said, angrily, "it's Dell. He shook hie head, "I have not seen her for over a year," he said. It was for exactly a year that his intimacy with Lenore Lepeil had lasted. Dove-eyed, demure, gloved," (she would die of shame to be seen even putting on her gloves in the street!) "and a little mother to ahost of squalling brats—apparently she is your ideal of what a woman should be!" "listen, Lenore," he said. "We have had a good time, you and 1. and now we are going to part. No one will say anything. In the present lax state of society, our affairs are no one' business but our own, and plenty of men are ready to take my place—for beauty is so very, very rare." Suddenly it struck him how horrible it was that he should be sitting here, saying these things—incredible things; but the girl her- self had put the cart before the horse. Anrt yet he was to blame a man is always to blame if he lets a woman make herself common and cheap to him. Tt's Dell," she said, under her breath. "Bell. Dell. Dell!" Lenore," he said, and almost groaned, If why don't you women make us men respect you—Heaven knows we are eager enough to do it!" Lenore laughed con temptuonsly. Her sleepy eyes were now widely open, for she knew that she had played her cards badly— carelessly—and lost the man. Nor could she punish him. When a woman claims complete indipendence, and emanci- pate horsel? wholly from home authority, she forfeits the protection that her mankind could and would extend t-o her did she con- form to the canons of conduct that rule girls who respect themselves. Of course, she knew that these accidents sometimes happened to ITirls of her views and habits-that marriages, drifted towards without visible intention on the part of the man, sometimes did not come off; but it was very rarely that a man had the moral courage to "get out" at the last moment, and she had not for a moment expected such courage in Brwee Gibson. And the man was rich, desirable in every way, and—here was the -ing-he would go back to Dell and mam her, a,nd she, beauti- ful TA-nore. would have to put up with one of the inferior men eager to take Brace's place. "I feel a cad and a beast," he said; "yet I know that what I am doing is for the happi- ness of both of us-if love were not forth- coming from me you would se-elk it else- where." "Oh! don't mind me," said Lenore, in a. ■hard, dry voice. It has taken you a con- siderable time to find out that we were thoroughly unsnited to each ether—but batter late than never." He whitened, understanding now why Fir) many men married unhappily—because it was easier to them lo be unhappy than cads; yet he knew that his whole future life hung or the issues of the next few moments that he must be a brute, and a resolute one. if "he were to cut himself dear of her—and (Suddenly he sprang to bis feet. "Yes-, go," fne said, furiously; "go back to Dell," and turned on him a face so deformed by passion. that he hardly knew it. Truly, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned," and he felt like a beaten hound as he left her. The children were all at school, and Dell was alone in the little llighgate house, frag- rant with flowers, when Miss Lepeil was announced. There was only a very slight acquaintance between the two, and Dell roooe, surprised, as the tall, beautiful girl swept in made a pretence of touching her hand, and plunged at once into the subject that had brought her there. Mis? Brunton," she said, for a year Bruce Gibson and I have gone about every- where together. He behaved to me as the girl he was gcing to marry, and now he has left, mc. Dell had been working; now she folded her hands on the work, and said, gently: "He asked you to marry him?" "Man do not ask girl nowadays," said ¡ Lenore hotly. "They just drift into an engagement; but the one who backs out is— dif:honoUtl"a hie." For a moment Dell was silent, a lovely colour coming into her cheeks, that trans- formed her almost to beauty. "I don't know," she said, quietly. "You see. that's all just pia-yine: róund, and marriage is a working partnership, is it not? A man should be .:0 very, very sure before he and a girl should hesitate so very, very long before she "Oh! call it sordid prudence, not love,' cried Lenore—"the sort cf 'Love me little, love me long' business." "Hasty love is quickly crone," concluded lifted hcr brown cye3—"Bruce loved me, and, when he asked I me, I was prepared to confess- that I loved him; but you took him away from me—you made hi'rn apparently one of that fast brigade to which you bng. But he is. too I strong, too fastidious a man to permanently adopt its manner" and mode of life. Have you come here to ask me to persuade him to retu-rn to it?" "I have come to you;" said Lencre, "to put it to you, as a point of honour between one woman and another, not to take him back as yonr lover when he really belongs to me." Who speaks of 'honour'? Who stole first?" cried DtU, with a strange note of passion in 1.{,I" usually quiet voice. "We were very happy, and, though I am plain, I coukl have I made him the sort of wife he wanted. Oh! you beautiful people are never such happy, beloved wives as we despised ones, who study a men, and keep his home sweet and restful for him!" "Bestial, with a houseful of brats!" cried Iienore, furiously, the atmosphere of the rcom. the soft white needlework under the girl's wo:np..t1:r hand, t ho wing in sudden violent contrast to her own hridge-playing- cigarettc-smoking entourage, as she knew it would to Bruce when he came—for come lie "arelv would. "I love children," said Dell, and touched with an exquisite gesture of tenderness the work in her lap. "I could no more do with- cut my little brothers anù sisters (especially :lOW our dear mother is dead) than they could do without me. And Bruce"—her voic-3 unconsciously softpne<l—"loves them too." "And I hate them. The yare a fearful ex. pense and awful worry. So you will take Bruce back?" "No!" The voice was very soft, but very final, and the man who, finding the front door open.. had walked in with the freedom. of an old friend, heard it as he paused on the thres- hold of the drawing-rocm. "Then he will co'hc back to me!" cried 1-encre, springing up joyously. "Don't move, my carriage is waiting in the lane. May [ go through this window?" and. with no fur ther ieave-taking, and the usual lack or manners of her tyre, she vanished. 3X11, left alone, mutely interrogated the ceiling and iumiiture, instead 07 lk.aven, and resumed her work; bur a tear fell en it, and rusted her needle. "She is very lovely, and he is just-, man." .-be said. Than, hearing a slight sound he- hind h?' turned to "race standing ju.;t in-sii'e Jie dcor. "0'?. ;h:' ?.ied, wa"mly. "do you add caveodrc-pi'irg to ycrnr 01 lie- good quatiti??" He mada no reply, but in a. methodic.?' 'ay brju?ht a chair up, and wat down opposite hsr. He was yttte and thin, but handsomer than e-er. she thourh-. in hi: lean, brown way; and he bad the look in bis eyes that had always m-asterei her before she found him out as the weak, self-indul- gent beauty-lover that he had proved him- self for the pa.st year. "JX>U," he said, qr.ietly, "I beard your pro- iniso to Miss Lepeil just now, a.nd you have just got to break it, even as I have refused to pay my debt of honour to her. We will be moral runagates if you like—but "Speak for yourself," she said, coldly, and took up the work on her lap, and drove her rusted reddle steadily through it. "While the man in abroad, sowing tares, the womai sits at home, and thinks to some purpose. Go back to Miss Lepeil. She has many olaims on you"—there was scorn in her voice—"that I have not, that I never should have, were we engaged a lifetime." Then she turned resolutely to other matters, inquired for his people, spoke of her father and the children, gave him tea. and made him feel that for a whole year he bad sbut himself out from the only real lio,no that since his mother's death he had ever known. Whan, six months later, the engasrement of Miss Lepeil was anounced to a rich mus- tard maker, and it was followed, at no grea. distance of time, by the marriage of "that handsoms, charming, rich Mr. Gibson to homely girl of the 'Little Dorrit' type, named Dell Brunton"—or so said the world-neither Bruce nor Dell minded.

I ——————— (CARDIFF EXCHANGE…

I LAWN TENNIS.I

Advertising

For Women Folk.I

PHIZE SHOOTING. I

z=zz.?==- - -I B'J XING.

-BOWLS. - I

ISWIMMING.I

I-Passing Pleasantries.I

Advertising

Dash for the Bridges

CARDIFF V. BRISTOL. I

A DRAW. I A POINTLESS DRAW.I

-- - I QUEEN'S PARK RANGERS…

MERTHYR TOWN WIN.I

Advertising

I LOCAL TIDE TABLE.I

MARATHON RACE AT BRYNMAWR.

Advertising