Books: Model Man

HARNESS—A. Hamilton Gibbs*—Little Brown ($2.50).

Michael Gordon is the ideal husband—brilliant war record, handy about the house, shaggy tweeds, chugging pipe. He worships his wife, aids and abets her stage career. They find a storybook cottage—thatch roof, rambler roses, flagstones—he settles down to his writing, she commutes to her London theatre. Every midnight he meets her in the two-seater, serves her supper at the blazing hearth, listens to her footlight triumphs. In short, he is so thoroughbred that she succumbs to the illicit blandishments of the leading man in her show. Fond Michael, suddenly informed, spoils the matinée idol’s beauty with a black eye and bloody nose. The wife repents.

Charmingly written, Harness develops poignantly a man’s fine emotion, sympathetically a woman’s illogical but inevitable reaction.

* A. Hamilton Gibbs and Philip Gibbs are brothers.