"Stahle saw this—he could have wished it were otherwise. He was at a loss how to proceed. After taking one or two turns across the room, he said, 'Gertrude, I want all the children's clothes packed in a trunk, and ready by noon to-morrow.'
"'The children,' asked I, in surprise, 'are you going to send the children away? Where are they going?'
"'That's my affair,' he rudely answered.
"I asked no questions; I simply said 'The trunk shall be ready,' and went on with my sewing. I did not know then as I do now, that it was the first of a projected and deliberate series of attempts to injure me, by creating the impression that the children were not well cared for. He could not well have wounded me more deeply. I—who had so conscientiously striven to perform my duty to the motherless. I—who, when any little question between the children was to be decided, gave the preference to his children, lest I might wrong them even in a trifle—those 'trifles,' which, to childhood are matters of as grave importance as our adult affairs.
"The cunning malignity of this act was worthy of Stahle. I made no complaint, I asked the children no question which I was too proud to ask the father. The little trunk was packed, and Stahle remarking that he should be gone two days, the carriage drove off. It was some comfort that the children ran up to me, and put up their lips spontaneously for a kiss, as they were leaving; it was more still that my conscience acquitted me before God of any intentional sin of omission toward them.
"I had just begun to see the good effect of systematic training on natures sweet and good, though neglected and misdirected. Their wardrobes were amply supplied, the books purchased to teach them—and now—well, I bore the cross uncomplainingly at least, and when Stahle returned, no trace of what had occurred was perceptible in my manner, or habits. He was evidently as much at a loss to understand my self-control, as to cope with it. He had expected a scene—an outburst of indignant feeling—an angry altercation in which his nature might vent itself in a brutal reply. He judged me by the women whom he had all his life known. He was at fault.
"His next step was to break up housekeeping and board out; for this also, he gave me no reason. Whole days he passed without speaking to me, and yet, at the same time, no inmate of a harem was ever more slavishly subject to the gross appetite of her master. It was now midwinter; I had a bad cough, and was suffering from want of flannels and thick under-clothes; he furnished me with no funds for the purpose. This was to compel me to do what would give him some advantage over me—run in debt. I foresaw this, and avoided it, confining myself to my insufficient clothing.
"Stahle always selected a boarding-house for our residence, the mistress of which was her own mistress—(i. e., a widow or a single woman). Immediately upon going to such a house, a private understanding sprung up between Stahle and herself, and the servants taking their cue from their mistress, I found it quite impossible to get any thing I wanted. This was less of a trial to me than it might have been, had I not been accustomed to wait upon myself; but one is necessarily circumscribed in a boarding-house; the cellar may not be visited for coal, or the kitchen for water, if the landlady does not see fit to have the bells answered; neither, if she chooses to decree otherwise, and your husband is in the conspiracy, can you be waited on at the table till every one else has been served. Stahle often finished his dinner and rose from the table while my plate and Arthur's, had not been once filled. He studiously insulted me by this public neglect, and to make it still more marked, helped every one else, even the men, within reach. Of this, also, I took no outward notice.
"One day the landlady came to me with a manner so bland that I was instantly on my guard. She complimented my hair, my figure, my manners. She wondered I never came down out of my room into the public parlor. She intimated that the gentlemen were very desirous of making my acquaintance, particularly one, by the name of Voom—with whom, by the way, I had seen Stahle leave the house, arm in arm. I saw through the plot at once—but received it as if I did not, treated her just as civilly as if she were not a female Judas, and resolutely kept my own apartment.