"Are you ready?" he asked.
"Yes, papa."
The General then began to dictate to her what she was to write. It was as follows:
"MY DEAR OLD FRIEND,--I think it will cause you some grief to hear that our long friendship is about to be broken up. My days, I fear, are numbered."
Zillah stifled the sobs that choked her, and wrote bravely on:
"You know the sorrow which has blighted my life; and I feel that I could go joyfully to my beloved, my deeply mourned wife, if I could feel that I was leaving my child--her child and mine--happily provided for. For this purpose I should like Guy, before he leaves for India, to fulfill his promise, and, by marrying my daughter, give me the comfort of knowing that I leave her in the hands of a husband upon whom I can confidently rely."
But at this point Zillah's self-control gave way. She broke down utterly, and, bowing her head in her hands on the desk, burst forth into a passion of sobs.
The poor child could surely not be blamed. Her nature was impassioned and undisciplined; from her birth every whim had been humored, and her wildest fancies indulged to the utmost; and now suddenly upon this petted idol, who had been always guarded so carefully from the slightest disappointment, there descended the storm-cloud of sorrow, and that too not gradually, but almost in one moment. Her love for her father was a passion; and he was to be taken from her, and she was to be given into the hands of entire strangers. The apparent calmness, almost indifference, with which her father made these arrangements, cut her to the quick. She was too young to know how much of this eagerness was attributable entirely to disease. He appeared to her as thinking of only his own wishes, and showing no consideration whatever for her own crushing grief, and no appreciation of the strength of her affection for him. The self-sacrificing father had changed into the most selfish of men, who had not one thought for her feelings.
"Oh, Zillah!" cried her father, reproachfully, in answer to her last outburst of grief. She rose and went to his bedside, struggling violently with her emotion.
"I can not write this, dearest papa," she said, in a tremulous voice; "I have promised to do just as you wish, and I will keep my word; but indeed, indeed, I can not write this letter. Will it not do as well if Hilda writes it?"