Page:A hairdresser's experience in high life.djvu/128

This page has been validated.
130
A hair-dresser's experience

delighted with the beautiful boquets sent to her, and the elegant vases and baskets that came in; but all failed to please her, and she became more and more unhappy Nothing could be done to please her, by any one; had she been a princess, from foreign lands, there could not have been more attention shown her, than by the family of Noble. But, as she did not love him, any attention from his family was unpleasant to her. It was truly distressing to visit her apartments sometimes, as she was at times gay, cheerful, and full of spirits; at others she would walk the floor as if frenzied, then sit down at the piano and run over all the sentimental pieces she could think of; then rummage over old letters, read them, sometimes laugh and sometimes cry. She kept the likeness of her former lover, which she had a great deal of trouble in secreting. When her husband would come in and find her in her tantrums, he knew she had either been receiving letters, looking over old ones, or writing.

This unhappiness lasted for a long time, without any person finding out or knowing anything of it; but at length a cousin of Noble's found it out, and undertook to increase the trubles of his cousin. His visits were constant; he would tell Minnie that Noble's family was wealthy, and she should have a great many more things than she had, and by his conversation made her very unhappy; then, on her husband's coming in, she would treat him in a very unladylike manner, for which treatment she would give no reason to him.

On one occasion she told him her mother had written for her to come home, when she really had not heard from her mother for ten days. He often