The Jealous Wife

From the Treasure of the Rosary, part 4, miracle 85.

A gentleman who was deeply devoted to the Blessed Virgin Mary kept a small oratory in his house, with a beautiful statue of Our Lady, where he often went to pray. He prayed there not only by day but in the night, rising from bed and leaving his room to honor her. His wife, though herself a devout woman, noticed him slipping away in the dead of night and staying away a long time, and she grew jealous and suspicious.

One day she asked him whether he loved any woman other than her. Smiling, he said that he loved the most beautiful lady in the world, that he had given her his whole heart, and that he would rather die than stop loving her. He meant the Blessed Virgin, but his wife did not understand, and grew more suspicious still. She asked whether he left their room each night to meet this lady, and, not seeing her distress, he answered yes. Deceived and blinded by jealousy, one night while he was at his prayers she cut her own throat in despair and quickly died.

When he returned and found the bed wet, then discovered her lying dead in her blood, he understood what had happened. He locked the room, went back to the chapel, threw himself down before the statue, and wept, begging Our Lady to help him, since it was while honoring her that this ruin had come upon him.

No sooner had he prayed than a servant called him, saying his wife was asking for him. He could hardly believe it, but he went, opened the door, and found her alive. She threw herself at his feet in tears, begged his pardon, and said that the Mother of God, through his prayer, had delivered her from hell. They went together to give thanks, and the next day she told the whole story to their relatives, showing the mark of the wound, and all of them were stirred to a greater love of Our Lady.

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Source:

Simplified retellings of the "example" stories that St. Alphonsus Liguori placed at the end of each section of The Glories of Mary. These are paraphrased in plain modern prose, faithful to the substance of the 1888 English translation. Liguori himself, in his author's "Protest," noted that the miracles and apparitions in the book are offered on human authority only, not as articles of faith.