The brother clerks

by Mary Ashley Townsend

"Of you. Would you like to be free, Minny?"

"Free, Miss Della? to have my freedom, and leave you?"

"Yes, Minny, if you would like your freedom, you shall have it this very night; papa will do anything I say with regard to it, and you may go, dear Minn, whenever you choose. You shall have money to carry you where you like. In the North you might do well; marry some rich abolitionist, perhaps, and be very happy. I am in earnest, Minn; you have but to speak."

"Miss Della, if I have offended you in any way, if I have hurt your heart by any means, if I have spoken, acted, or looked anything that displeased you, do anything to punish me save sending me from you. What would my freedom be to me away from you? Miss Della, you will never know how poor Minn loves you."

The girl had spoken in such a subdued voice, uttering her short sentences between the sobs that were trying to struggle up, that, as she paused in her task, and looked in her mistress's face with an expression of such tearful, doubtful anxiety on her features, Della was deeply touched, and sat a moment with her handkerchief pressed to her eyes. She took it down at last, and went on very calmly and thoughtfully.

"Minny, it is very painful for me to talk of this, but you must understand me: I'm afraid I can never be quite happy again, with you performing such offices as this for me. The discovery I made this afternoon—that unfortunate discovery for both of us—was terrible—very terrible!"

"Oh, Miss, that of all things you should have asked me that! I will never, never remember it, if you will only forget it, and let me be to you what I have ever been."

"I was right in what I suspected—I am sure I guessed the truth—you must tell me now, Minny," said Della, taking one of Minny's hands in hers, and speaking in a tone half doubtful that she might be wrong. "My father was your father, n'est ce pas, dear Minny?"

Heedless of the kindness with which the words were spoken, Minny threw up her hands with a gesture of despair, then flung herself full length upon the floor, in a burst of passionate grief.