Zulima smiled—oh, what a mocking smile! how full of wild anguish it was! “Another!” she said; “so now another loves me.”
“No human being ever loved as I love you, Zulima,” said the young man, in that pure, sweet voice, which had so affected her before.
“That is a marvel,” said Zulima, with a bitter smile. “Others have loved me so well. You do not know how others have loved me.”
“I do not wish to know any thing except how I can make you happier than you are, Zulima.”
“If you wish to make me happy, do not even mention love to me again. The very word makes me faint,” said Zulima. “I am ill—I suffer. Do not, I pray you, talk this way to me. I can not bear it.”
“I will say nothing that can distress you,” replied the young man gently, but with a look of grief.
Zulima reached forth her hand. It was cold and trembling. “Farewell!” she said, very kindly; “I shall go away to-morrow. Farewell!”
He would not release her hand.
“You are not going far—you will return in a few days? Promise me that you are not saying farewell forever.”
“I do not know—the Father in heaven only knows what will become of me; but you have been kind to me—very. You have respected my unprotected lot. You did not know how wrong it was to love me. I can not blame you. When I say farewell thus, I much fear that it is to the only true friend that I have in the world. You could not wish me to feel more regret than I do. Is it not casting away all the unselfish kindness—all the real friendship that I have known for a long, long time?”