John Emerson, a clean-cut manly man, worships his beautiful but weak and misguided wife, Cleo, and is blind to her disloyalty, although she gives him every evidence of her aversion. She is carrying on a flirtation with John's employer, ...See moreJohn Emerson, a clean-cut manly man, worships his beautiful but weak and misguided wife, Cleo, and is blind to her disloyalty, although she gives him every evidence of her aversion. She is carrying on a flirtation with John's employer, Robert Lawler, and Lawler wishing to make his conquest complete, sends her husband out of town on a business deal, and invites her to take an automobile ride. She accepts, and fascinated by each other's illicit companionship and with their sense dulled by the fumes of too much wine, take no notice of the time. John arrives home early, and not finding his wife, sits down to wait for her. At the sound of an automobile stopping in front of the house he looks out and sees her and Lawler as they return from their ride. When his wife comes in John upbraids her for her disloyalty, and on the arrival of Lawler, who comes to return Cleo's purse, which she had left in the automobile, the two men come to blows, Emerson knocking his employer to the floor. Six months later, John Emerson, now divorced, reads of Cleo's marriage to Lawler and their departure for Europe on their honeymoon. Broken in health and spirits. Emerson leaves for the North Woods, where he finds rest and recreation in hunting and fishing. On one of his many rambles, he meets Anita, known as Anita of the Woodland, and is completely captivated by her exceptional beauty and simplicity. Friendship ripens into love, but before he asks for her hand, he tells the story of his former wife. In the meantime Cleo and her husband quarrel and Lawler, who has tired of her, becomes enamored of another woman, a married woman whose husband finds them in a compromising situation and kills both. Cleo now a wealthy widow returns to New York, and getting John's address from one of his friends, arrives at his cabin in the woods while he is away. Returning, and for the moment blinded by her beauty, he takes her in his arms. Anita, coming in at the moment when he is about to take Cleo back, he realizes that Anita is the one he really loves, and offers her a home and his protection while Cleo returns to New York a sadder and wiser woman. Written by
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