Ross had omitted in that epistle nothing that could persuade or reason into wrong. It was doubtful, he said, even if Clark ever had been married to Zulima; or, being so, if he would not deem it a good service in his friends to relieve him of the obligations imposed by that union. Bitter and cruel were the accusations urged against that poor young wife; and with his interests all with her enemies, joined to a lively desire to think ill of her, in order to justify his conduct to his own heart, this weak and cruel man yielded himself to become the tool of a deeper and far more unprincipled villain than himself. Again and again he perused that letter, and at length put it carefully away in his breast-pocket, close to a heart which its evil folds were doomed to harden against the secret whisperings of a conscience that would not be entirely hushed.
Perhaps, had James Smith been given time for after reflection, he might have become shocked with the part that he was called upon to perform; but the letter which opened this wicked scheme to him had been delayed and carried in a wrong direction by the mail, and nearly two weeks had been thus lost after the time when it should have reached him.
Smith had scarcely turned from his desk with the evil letter in his bosom, when another man entered the warehouse and placed a little rose-tinted note in his hand. A vague idea that this note had some connection with the slovenly epistle that he had just read took possession of him, before he broke the drop of pale-green wax that sealed it.
The conjecture proved real—Zulima had written that note. She was in Philadelphia, and hoped through her husband’s protege to hear some news of him. Smith had no time for reflection; he was called upon to act at once. He went to the hotel where Zulima was staying. Smith entered the hotel hurriedly, as one who has a painful task to accomplish and wishes it over. He was not villain enough to act with deliberation, or with that crafty coldness which fitted Ross so singularly for a domestic conspirator. When he found himself in the presence of this helpless young mother; when he gazed upon her beauty, dimmed—it is true, by all that she had suffered, but obtaining thereby a soft melancholy that was far more touching than the glow of youth in its full joy can ever be,—his heart smote him for the wrong it had meditated against her. He sat down by her side, trembling and almost as anxious as she was.
“My husband,” said Zulima, turning her eloquent eyes upon his downcast face; “you know him, sir—he is your friend; tell me where he is to be found.”
“Your husband, madam! of whom do you speak?”
“Of Mr. Clark—Daniel Clark—your benefactor and my husband,” said Zulima.
“Daniel Clark, lady?”
“I wish to see him—I must see him—tell me where he is to be found.” Zulima was breathless with impatience; her large eyes brightened, her cheeks took a faint color. She was determined that nothing should keep her from the presence of her husband.
“And you—you are the young lady that went South with him the last time he was here?” said Smith, bending his eyes to the floor and faltering in his speech.