Though I was but a girl, I would have gone to Death,
sooner than ask him for a word, if a word of his could have saved me.
I would! To any death that could have been invented. But my mother,
covetous always, sent to him in my name, told the true story of my
case, and humbly prayed and petitioned for a small last gift - for not
so many pounds as I have fingers on this hand. Who was it, do you
think, who snapped his fingers at me in my misery, lying, as he
believed, at his feet, and left me without even this poor sign of
remembrance; well satisfied that I should be sent abroad, beyond the
reach of farther trouble to him, and should die, and rot there? Who
was this, do you think?'
'Why do you ask me?' repeated Harriet.
'Why do you tremble?' said Alice, laying her hand upon her arm' and
looking in her face, 'but that the answer is on your lips! It was your
brother James.
Harriet trembled more and more, but did not avert her eyes from the
eager look that rested on them.
'When I knew you were his sister - which was on that night - I came
back, weary and lame, to spurn your gift. I felt that night as if I
could have travelled, weary and lame, over the whole world, to stab
him, if I could have found him in a lonely place with no one near. Do
you believe that I was earnest in all that?'
'I do! Good Heaven, why are you come again?'
'Since then,' said Alice, with the same grasp of her arm, and the
same look in her face, 'I have seen him! I have followed him with my
eyes, In the broad day.
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