Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 19, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 June 1879 — TAKEN AT HIS WORD. [ARTICLE]

TAKEN AT HIS WORD.

A Pleasant Love Story. Nellie Palmer was lying on the lounge in her pretty bedroom, crying and looking very unhappy. And yet she bad been married only six months; aud to such a “nice, handsome man,” as all the young ladies declared, that surely she ought to have been happy with him. Aud so she bad been, until—until, to tell the truth, Mr. Bob Palmer, forgetting, or seeming to forget, that he was a married man, had recently taken to flirting with these very young ladies, at all the parties in Middletou, leaving his wife to take care of herself. Surely it was enough to make any six-months’ wife cry —especially one so sensitive as Nellie. Not that Mr. Robert Palmer loved his little wife a bit less than on the day of his marriage- neither that Nellie suspected him of it, or for a moment doubted his morals, any more than she did his constancy. But Mr. Palmer was a gay young man, aud loved to amuse himself aud to be amused. He liked the society of pretty and lively women, both married aud single; and, in a word, he liked to flirt, and saw no harm in it. So, while he hung over the young ladies’ chairs, laughing and paying gay compliments, or promenading with the married ladies, his wife would be looking over a photograph album, or conversing solemnly with some old gentleman, or noticing some shy and awkward child, while pretending to be unconscious of her husband’s proceedings. Not that she was compelled to enjoy herself in this solemn way—she, usually so bright, and pretty, and agreeable—but she had no heart for anything else now. Of late, all her liveliness and chattiness had left her, and she answered absently and smiled listlessly, and, if compelled to dance or sing, did so out of time and out of tune, to her husband’s great vexation. It is thus that many a young wife settles down into a dull and faded old woman, while her husband grows handsomer and heartier, and wonders what on earth could have so changed her. “Hallo I been crying again, I declare I ” exclaimed Mr.' Bob Palmer, suddenly ceasing his little whistle, as he entered the room, on returning from his office. “What’s the matter now, Nellie? Canary refused to sing, or Madame Viglini not put flowers enough in your bonnet?” “Oh, Bob! how can you?” sobbed Nellie, beginning afresh. “Look here, Ellen,” said her husband, sitting down on the lounge, and speak ing more seriously; “I don’t like this at all. I never come home that your eyes are not red and swollen with crying. What have you to cry about, I should like to know? It’s an insult to me to go sniveling about the house in this fashion, aud moping away in corners, looking sullen and miserable, as you did last night, at Macklin’s. Why, people will think me a perfect domestic tyrant!” “Ah, Bob, don’t speak so! I can’t help it, indeed. Ido feel so miserable. You make me so, Bob.” “I! Well, that is rich! Perhaps you will be good enough to let me know of what enormity I’ve been guilty, that has turned you into a modern Niobe?” “Nothing really wrong, dear; but, oh! if you knew how much a wife thinks of her husband’s love, and—” Here poor Nellie broke down again. Mr. Palmer’s eyes opened very wide. “Whew!” whistled he; “if this isn’t really absurd. So, she’s jealous! ” “Indeed, no, dear Bob! But—but” —she could hardly speak for the choking in her throat—“you can’t understand the pride a woman takes in having her husband treat her with affection and respect before every one, or how it humbles and mortifies her to be neglected by him, and have other women consider themselves her rivals —like Isabel Baden.” Mr. Bob Palmer laughed outright, and then he grew angry. “ You’re an absurd little fool, Nellie,” he said. “As if Isabel Baden were anything to me beyond a pleasant and agreeable young .woman to amuse one’s self with at a party. Nonsense! ” “She don’t think so,” said Nellie; “and—and the others don’t think so. They all think you are getting tired of your wife, and Isabel flatters herself that she has cut me out, and is trying to let people see it.” “ Fiddlesticks! ” said Bob, rising impatiently from the lounge. “ I’m astonished at you, Nellie, and had really given you credit for more sense as well as temper,” he added, severely. “I wish you’d amuse yourself in society as I do, instead of going moping about in this fashion. You can’t expect to have me tied to your apron-strings; and I’d much

rather see yon flirting a little yourself than skulking away in holes and corners, like a spider, watching your butterfly of a husband to see if you can’t detect him in doing wrong. You make me quite ashamed of you, I declare.” Mr. Palmer took his hat and walked out of the room with an air of mingled dignity and injured innocence.. His wife sat up, wiped away her tears, and mused awhile, with eyes flashing and cheeks flushed with wounded and indignant feeling. “ Yes,” she said to herself, “ since he has requested it, I will amuse myself ‘as he does,’and see how he likes it! Ashamed of me, is he ? And he did not' use to be so when I was gay and happy. Oh, Bob, if you only knew how I loved you! ” And once more, despite her resolutely closing her eyes and pressing her fingers upon them, the tears would come.

There was to be, that very evening, a party at Col. Johnston’s, and Nellie took particular pains in dressing herself for it. She had been, of late, rather careless on this point, and was now rewarded for her extra care by her husband’s glance of approval and his remark that the pink silk was becoming to her. In consequence, her eyes and cheeks were brighter, and her spirits more buoyant, as she entered Mrs. Johnston’s crowded drawing-rooms. Scarcely had they paid their respects to the hostess, when Mr. Palmer accosted, or, rather, was accosted, by Miss Baden, a brilliant, confident girl, who tried to ensnare him before his marriage; and, at the same moment, a gentleman addressed Mrs. Palmer. She answered mechanically, unable to withdraw her attention from her husband and his companion, until, seeing something in Miss Baden’s glance at herself which she did not like, her pride again awoke, and she turned, as with a sudden determination, to the gentlemaa at her side. He was a recent comer to the town—very pleasant and handsome—and Nellie Palmer forthwith began to try and make herself agreeable to him. He looked so pleased, and was himself so agreeable, that it soon cost her no effort to converse; and then her old lively spirits returned; and, to her surprise, she found that she was enjoying herself. Her husband didn’t much notice this, but Miss Baden did; and her flirtation with Mr. Palmer lost much of its charm, now that his wife did not appear mortified and jealous, aud that people couldn’t see that she was so. Wherefore Mies Baden grew indifferent, and Mr. Palmer bethought himself to look after his wife. Not finding her looking over the photograph albums, nor talking to deaf old Mr. Brown, neither in any of the “holesand corners” which she was wont of late to frequent, he became rather puzzled. “She’s got in the dumps again, I suppose,” was his thought, “ au 4 is trying to disguise it under pretense of being ill. Dare say I shall find her crying or faintiug away in the conservatory, with fans and smelling-bottles round her—or perhaps she’s gone home.” At that instant a little laugh at his elbow startled him, and, turning, he saw Nellie, bright and flushed, talking to a very handsome man, who appeared quite absorbed in her. Mr. Palmer stared a moment at the unconscious couple. “Why, the deuce! ” was his thought; “ what on earth can they have been talking about all this while?” Then suddenly meeting his wife’s eye, he smiled, and whispered, “ Enjoying yourself, Nell?” “Oh, yes, dear, delightfully I Don’t trouble yourself about me, pray.” He passed on, but didn’t go far, and, as he stood whispering soft nothings to sentimental Kate Marshall, his eyes occasionally wandered to his wife. How pretty she was looking and how gay she was, and how coquettishly she was exchanging light repartee with that flirting fellow, Tom Harrison. And all the while the handsome stranger never left her side. It was perfectly evident that he admired her. “If she were not a married woman he would certainly fall in love with her—she—my wife;” and he felt a little resentful of the almiration. Nellie Palmer had never sung more sweetly, or danced more gracefully than upon this evening. “Don’t youthink, Nell, you’ve danced enough for one night?” said her husband, toward the close of the evening; “for a married woman,” he added. “Perhaps so,” she answered, cheerfully; “but I’ve enjoyed myself so much! Really, I almost forgot that I was a married woman, and felt like a girl again.” “And behaved like one,” he said, rather coolly. “ Who is that fellow that has been in attendance upon you all the evening?” he inquired, as they walked down stairs. “That remarkably handsome man, with the expressive dark eyes, do you mean ? ”

“ I never noticed his eyes or that he was at all handsome,” he answered, stiffly. “ Oh, I thought you meant Capt. Lovell, of the artillery. Ahl here he is—just one moment, dear—l quite forgot—” And Nellie spoke a few words to the Captain in passing, of which her husband could distinguish only something about “ that book.” “ Upon my word,” he said sarcastically, “you appear very intimate already.” “ Because, love, we’ve discovered that we’re congenial spirits. We like the same things—books, music, scenery; indeed, everything—and have the same opinions on most subjects. You know how pleasant it is to meet with one who can comprehend you—not your outer self merely, but with a sort of soul sympathy.” “ Soul fiddlesticks! ” “ You never did have much sentiment, Bob,” sighed Nellie, in an injured tone. “ Sentiment be hanged 1 Come, Nellie, be quick with your wrappings. It has been a stupid evening, and I shall be glad to get home and to bed.” When Robert Palmer came home next day, he found his wife, not crying, as before, in her bedroom, but in the parlor, practicing a new song. “ Capt. Lovtll called this morning,” she said, “ and I have promised to sing this for him at Mrs. Campbell’s.” “Ah 1 ” he answered, with an expression of indifference; and, ns his wife again struck up with the first few notes, he muttered to himself, “ Confound Capt. Lovell 1” At Mrs. Campbell’s, Capt. Lovell was again in attendance upon pretty Mrs. Palmer; and then other gentlemen discovered her attractions, her piquancy, and coquettishness, and flirtableness; and so, in a very few weeks, Mrs. Palmer was a belle. She did not seem in the least to care who her husband was attending upon, and, indeed, he could rarely get a word with her at all, when at the gay assemblies which they constantly frequented. He sometimes gave her a hint that she was “ no longer a -girl/’ and that he was her husband; but she only laughed, and said there was no harm done, and that she was enjoying herself so delightfully, and felt herself more a belle than even when a girl—which was true, because she had not flirted then, being absorbed, heart and soul, in Bob Palmer. But now it was Capt. Lovell who appeared chiefly to occupy her thoughts, as well as a good part of her time. She sung and danced with him j she read the books

he sent; and so frequent were his visits, so constant his attentions, that at last Mr. Robert Palmer’s wrath burst forth. “Ellen,” he said, as he one day closed the door on the departing Captain, “I really cannot permit this to go on any longer. Your conduct to me is moat unexpected—most astounding. You are by far too intimate with this fellow, Lovell. He is constantly in my house; and last evening he scarcely left your side, while you stood, for two hours, the center of a group of chattering, grinning popinjays, like himself.” “Why, Bob, you yourself blamed me for playing wall-flower and ‘ spider/ and said you were ashamed of me.” “I am much more ashamed of you now,” he retorted, severely. “ Now, dear, that is quite unreasonable of you. Didn’t you tell me that I would please you by enjoying myself and flirting a little? You know you did,” added Nellie, reproachfully; “ and now that I am obeying you, you get jealous.” “ Jealous? not 11 But lam offended and insulted —yes, and disgusted as well. If only you could hear the remarks about yourself and that Lovell ” “ Similar to those that I heard in regard to you and Miss Baden, I presume? ” said his wife. “What is Miss Baden to me?” he demanded, angrily. “And what is Capt. Lovell to me?” “You encourage him, madam. You flirt with him.” “As you do with Isabel Baden.” “A man may do what is not permissible in a woman.” “ Ah, that is it! ” said Nellie, with her old sigh. “ You men- may neglect a wife—may wear out her heart and life with anguish—may expose her to the pity or ridicule of all her acquaintance by showing devotion to another; and she, poor slave, must not presume to turn, as may even the trampled worm, but must bear all in meek tilenoe, never even imploring mercy, lest she offend her lord. But I have had enough of this, Bob; and now as you do to me will Ido to you. If you go on flirting, so will I. I know you don’t care a bit more for Isabel Baden than I do for Capt. Lovell; but I will not be neglected and humbled in the sight of the whole world. I am not a slave, but a wife, and demand the honor due to me I” Her mood was a new one to her husband. She sat erect and proud, looking him steadily in the face, with bright, clear eyes, in whose depths he could still read great tenderness; and he at once comprehended the whole matter. He looked at her a moment, as steadily as she at him, and then ho rose and took a seat by her side. “And you really care nothing for this Lovell, Nellie?” “No more than I ought to do for my cousin Laura’s affianced husband,” she replied. “Affianced ? ” “These six months; before I met him; and I would have told you of it, but ” She stopped, and looked half archly in his face. He understood her, and, taking her in his arms, kissed her tenderly. “ Oh, Bob! how could you ever have doubted ne ? ” “ I will do so no more, love! ” “ Never flirt any more ? ” “Never!” •