Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1885-04-30

| gone out of her life forever she feels numb
and cold, and dead, but she stands erect with
her little head thrown back, and her brave
voice says steadily: 81 never cared much
for anything, did 1? Iwas never one to 60
into heroics, though, l dare say, it is the
proper thing. Helen is in the garden go
| to her, and if you let me he your friend 1
shall be happy"
She gives him one of her hands and smiles,
and he kisses it and says: "Iou have made
me new man, Dulce. was miserable in
the thought that in gaining my happiness 1
would wreck yours"
"Well," she says evenly, "you need not
have been afraid, you see-now go;' and,
with last pressure of the hand he holds,
he goes from her.
And then Dulce lies down on the soft
grass, with her head on the knotted roots of
great oak. How still and calm it is
there-how tired she is. She will not go
home, but stay there always in the soft,
cool grassland Harold does not love her
does not love her-strange, she cannot cry
how dim the stars are groWing-and she
was to have been his wife-Harold's wife
she can almost laugh-Helen will be that
now-and what was that-a drop of rain
another-and still another-and faster they
come. How nice and cool they are, thinks
Dulce.
The grass is getting wet, and she pressed
her hot face and hotter hands into it.
She is not afraid, but she cannot think for
the noise the thunder makes. She is tired
so tired. The lightning blinds her eyes. AL
ways without Harold now. Can that be
! for her to bear. Never again to watch for
him. Never to hear his dear voice. "Ah,
God" cries the tortured girl heart, 81
cannot bear it!'
She raises herself in her drenched clothes
to her knees, and clasps the rugged tree
trunk with both arms.
II cannot bear it! Let me die! Let
me die!" And as if in answer to that pray
er there comes flash that seems to rend
the heavens, and the old oak is shattered to
| its roots.
The clinging arms loose their hold, the
aching heart is forever at rest, and the sum
ny head falls forward; Dulce has gone
''through the straight and dreadful pass of
DEATH"
Only one scene more: A quiet country
churchyard and little new-made grave.
The fresh earth, heaped above the stilled
form, is almost covered with white, scented
flowers, placed there by loving hands. All
is still, peaceful and lovely, and surely
Dulce is content, resting SO quietly among
the flowers she loved, with the soft sum-
mer breezes blowing over her. But across
the grass comes a man with white, hag-
gard face, and he falls with outstretched
arm prone upon the ground by the little
mound. O! Dulce, your heart never ached
as his does now! He went from Dulce. that
night, now week ago, with quick, eager
steps to her. And she laughed at him.
my dear Harold, shall. not marry you.
How absurd you are! Did say 1 loved
you. Well, you should not have believed
me. 1 am going home tomorrow to be
married. What! Have not told you that
before? You love me? Well, that is not
my fault. Love you? Not the least bit in
the world, my friend" and she smiled into
his face, serene, affable, nonchalant.
| And now he has brought his broken, re-
morseful heart to Dulce, and lies there, in
the still, evening twilight, without hope in
life or beyond it; with his changed face in
the damp earth and his outfung arms crush
ing the white flowers.