Myra

by Ann S. Stephens

“And who told you this infamous falsehood?” said Clark, clasping his hands till the blood left them, in the agony of his impatience.

“Ross hinted it; Smith told me so in Philadelphia and in Baltimore. They told me, also, that you were about to marry another; I saw you together with my own eyes. You refused to see me; but for that I had never believed them!”

“And Smith told you this; Ross hinted it,” cried Clark, locking his teeth with terrible anger. “These two men whom I have fed, whom—” he paused; the violence of his emotion was too great for words.

But why should we further describe the harrowing scene? It was long before these two unhappy beings could speak with calmness, but at length all was told—the fraud that had kept back their mutual letters, the slow and subtle poison that had been instilled so assiduously into each proud and passionate nature—all. For the first time, Clark learned the sufferings, the passionate love, that had sent his young wife in search of him, her struggles, her despair. Then his own haughty reserve gave way; he laid open his whole heart before her, its history and its anguish. He told her of his wanderings, of the deep and harrowing love; which not even a belief in her faithlessness could wring from his heart; he told her all, and then these proud beings sat again, side by side, looking in each other’s faces, and yet separated, oh, how irrevocably!

Then came the time for parting. Zulima must go back to her home, and he—where could he seek shelter from the grief of that terrible moment?

They both arose, and face to face, stood gazing on each other for the last time; neither of them doubted that it was for the last time, on this side the grave. A look of mournful despondency was on their features, their hands were clasped for an instant, and then Zulima turned away, and tottering feebly in her walk, passed from the garden. He stood watching her till the last flutter of her garments disappeared under the orange-boughs, then he turned away and went forth, a broken-hearted man. Mother and father both went away, leaving the child alone. Terrified by the scene of anguish passing before her, the little creature had neither moved nor spoken, and in the agony of that last parting she was forgotten. She had no heart for play then. The fish turned up their golden sides in vain, the humming-birds flashed by her quite unheeded; she was gazing after her father, and her eyes were full of tears. All at once, she saw him coming back, walking rapidly; tears were in his eyes also, and, taking her to his bosom, he kissed her forehead, her hair, and her little hands. Myra began to sob piteously. She could feel the swelling of his heart against her form; the hot fever of his lips as they touched her forehead, made her tremble, and cling closer to him; it seemed as if the little creature knew that this was the last time that noble heart would ever beat against hers—as if she felt in her whole being that he was her father. Thus, after a brief struggle, the parent and child parted, and forever.

That night Daniel Clark spent under the roof of his friend, Ross, the very roof that had sheltered his bridal life with Zulima and the birth of her child. He met his false friend calmly, and without any outbreak of the terrible sense of wrong that ached at his heart. He said truly, that reproaches are for slight wrongs, only his were too mighty for words. He never once hinted to the traitor that he was aware of his treachery. Perhaps the footsteps of coming death were pressing too heavily upon him, even then, for he whispered to his heart more than once that day, “Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, and I will repay it.”

There was no vengeance in Daniel Clark’s thoughts; for death was there already, and he felt that the little time given him on earth would scarcely be sufficient to right the wronged.

In the very chamber where Zulima had sat, amid the storm, writing her last soul-touching letter to her husband, was that husband at midnight, writing eagerly as she had been. His face was deathly pale one minute, and the next there spread over it a warm red hue, that seemed burning hotly through the flesh. He wrote on, sheet after sheet, linking the pages together as he completed them, with a black ribbon; and, notwithstanding the anguish that shook, and the fever that burned him, the writing, as it flowed from his pen, was firm and even as print.

Toward daylight the document was finished. Two black seals were placed at the last page, then the whole was folded up and carefully sealed. Weary and haggard was Daniel Clark, as he arose from his task; the bed stood in a corner of the chamber, cool and inviting, but he approached it not. With a heavy and wavering step, he reached the open window, and folding his arms upon the sill, turned his face to the soft night air, with a faint groan, and thus he remained till morning.