“Your wife, Dr. Delano? You have killed her, I think; but you’ll find your sweetheart in the bowling-alley.”
Like lightning it flashed upon the doctor that Murdock had blabbed the Dover affair. This explained the exceedingly cool air with which one or two had returned his greeting on alighting from the coach.
“Insolent coxcomb!” growled Dr. Delano, ready to fly at the colonel’s throat; but at the critical moment the clerk thrust a letter into his face, and as he took it, the other left the office. The thought flashed upon the doctor, at the sight of the superscription, that his wife had left the hotel. He returned to his rooms, and shutting himself in, opened Clara’s letter. At the sight of the enclosed one which he had written to Ella, he bit his lip and turned pale. Clara had written him the following:
“I enclose you a letter which was found, I suppose, by some one here. I received it through the post-office yesterday. I enclose, also, the hotel bill, which I have paid in full. As to the letter I do not blame you, since it is the expression of a passion that controls you, and I have not lost my faith in manhood because you have proved unworthy. I believe there are men too honorable to call two women ‘dearest’ in the same breath. If I did not, I should not be my father’s daughter.
“Surely, if there is crime in falseness, you stand accused before all courts of Love; yet you well know that the greatest crime is robbing me of the power to respect you. Love has conquered pride and even self-respect, up to this time, and I have submitted to being made a spectacle of pity and derision—I, the once adored, once honored Clara, forced by you to play the rôle of the hoodwinked wife! When married people desire to live together after they have outlived their illusions, I think they ought to guard each other’s honor before the world.
“No matter now. I am going to one who never fails me; one who always loves and caresses me, even when I commit the enormity of daring to suffer. I shall never meet you again, if I can avoid it. Please have my wardrobe, household linen, and whatever belongs specially to me, sent to my father.
“You can get a divorce on the ground of desertion, if you wish to marry. I am willing, and you need not fear that any one can persuade me into opposing you. I sincerely wish you a long and happy life with one who can always be happy, and not brood so much over imaginary troubles as to prevent her being a mother—whose love will not be a ‘suffocating warmth,’ but one to please you in every way.
“I thank you for sending the valerian powders. I think they were not indicated in my case.
“I write with calmness, after many hours of self-examination and cool reflection as to my best course. Rest assured that I shall not regret the step that gives you cause for a formal divorce, for you have been really divorced from me since the time when you took another to your heart. The letter is very little to me—the spirit everything.
“With kindly feeling,