rtrude. "It is all right."

"All right?" asked Jenny in surprise. "You cannot make me believe that,
_He_ alone at the table and _you_ up here with your door locked--come
confess, child, that you have not made it up."

"Please take a seat, Jenny," said the young wife, wearily.

Jenny sat down on the lounge, and Gertrude took up her position at the
window again. It was still as death in the room and in the whole house.

"It would have been wiser if you had not married at all, Gertrude,"
began her sister, with a sigh.

"But, it can't be helped--you are tied fast--oh, yes! You must put up
with everything, you must not even have an opinion of your own, I am
quite ill too from the vexation I had last evening. At last I ran up to
mamma. She was dreadfully frightened when she saw me standing before
her bed in my night-dress. I cried all night long. This morning I
waited. I thought he would come up for me, he was usually so
remorseful--but he didn't come and as I was taking breakfast with mamma
Sophie brought me a card from him in which he very coolly informed me
that he had gone to Manchester for a fortnight. Well--I wish him a
happy journey!"

Gertrude made no reply.

"You must not take it so dreadfully to heart, child," continued the
young matron. "Good gracious, it is well it is no worse. All women have
something to put up with and sometimes it is far worse than this."

"Have they?" asked Gertrude, in a low voice.

"Yes, of course!" cried Jenny, in surprise.

"Do you think a woman can take up her bundle and march off? Bah! Then
no woman would stay with her husband a moment. No, no,--people get
reconciled to one another and they just take the first opportunity to
pay each other off. That is always great fun for me. Just you see, pet,
how good Arthur will be when he comes back; for a whole month he will
be the nicest husband in the world."

"That would be an impossibility for me," cried Gertrude, clearly and
firmly. "To-day bitter as death, to-morrow fondly loving; it is simply
shameful."

Jenny was silent.

"Good gracious," she said at length, yawning, "one is as good as the
other! If I were to separate from Arthur,--who knows but I might get a
worse one! For of course I should marry again, what else can a woman
do? By the way, mamma spoke to the lawyer--he urgently advised her to
hush up the matter as well as possible. Mamma thought differently, but
Mr. Sneider declared--you see now, one _can't_ get away even