Arizona -- Social life and customs -- Fiction; Man-woman relationships -- Fiction; Religious fiction; Teachers -- Fiction
and marry him. She's a pretty good sport, too; she never lets you know
she isn't perfectly happy."
"She _is_ happy; mother, she's happier than _anybody_ I ever saw,"
declared the fourteen-year-old daughter of the house, who was home from
boarding-school for a brief visit during an epidemic of measles in the
school.
"Oh yes, she manages to make people think she's happy," said her mother,
indulgently; "but you can't make me believe she's satisfied to give up
her house on Fifth Avenue and live in a two-roomed log cabin in the
desert, with no society."
"Mother, you don't know! Why, _any_ woman would be satisfied if her
husband adored her the way Mr. Brownleigh does her."
"Well, Ada, you're a romantic girl, and Mr. Brownleigh is a handsome
man. You've got a few things to learn yet. Mark my words, I don't
believe you'll see Mrs. Brownleigh coming back next month with her
husband. This operation was all well enough to talk about, but I'll not
be surprised to hear that he has come back alone or else that he has
accepted a call to some big city church. And he's equal to the city
church, too; that's the wonder of it. He comes of a fine family himself,
I've heard. Oh, people can't keep up the pose of saints forever, even
though they do adore each other. But Mr. Brownleigh _certainly is_ a
good man!"
The vapid little woman sat looking reflectively out of the window for a
whole minute after this deliverance. Yes, certainly Mr. Brownleigh was a
good man. He was the one man of culture, education, refinement, who had
come her way in many a year who had patiently and persistently and
gloriously refused her advances at a mild flirtation, and refused to
understand them, yet remained her friend and reverenced hero. He was a
good man, and she knew it, for she was a very pretty woman and
understood her art well.
Before the day was over Margaret had reason to feel that a Sabbath in
Arizona was a very hard thing to find. The singing could not last all
day, and her friends seemed to find more amusements on Sunday that did
not come into Margaret's code of Sabbath-keeping than one knew how to
say no to. Neither could they understand her feeling, and she found it
hard not to be rude in gently declining one plan after another.
She drew the children into a wide, cozy corner after dinner and began a
Bible story in the guise of a fairy-tale, while the hostess slipped away
to take a nap. However, several other guests lingered about, and Mr.
Temple strayed in. They sat with newspapers before their faces and got
into the story, too, seeming to be deeply interested, so that, after
all, Margaret did not have an unprofitable Sabbath.
But altogether, though she had a gay and somewhat frivolous time, a good
deal of admiration and many invitations to return as often as possible,
Margaret was not sorry when she said good night to know that she was to
return in the early morning to her work.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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