Perhaps she would die when her trouble came. She hoped so, for she was weary of her life.
Out of the money that remained from her wages after paying her board, she had saved a few dollars. She would take it and go away. Mamma would not miss her much. She had never seemed the same to her children since she married the hard, stern man who kept her at work even more slavishly than when she was a widow, for he would not hire a servant, and she was compelled to do the drudgery of the house herself.
Pansy went into the house very quietly, then helped her mother with the supper, as was her usual custom. She pretended to eat something herself, then went up to her own little room, eager to make her arrangements for getting away.
There was not much to do, only to make up a bundle of such clothing as she would need the most and could conveniently carry. There were some tiny garments, too, clumsily fashioned by the poor girl’s unskillful hands; they must not be left behind. She tied them all up securely, put on her hat, and sat down to wait until the house should be still, when she would slip quietly out and make her way to the station, where she could take the first train to Petersburg.
She felt ill and wretched. Her heart was throbbing to suffocation. How dreadful the suspense was, how slowly the time crept by!
Thank Heaven, they were all abed at last, and she could go now.
She rose up with her bundle, shrinking a little at the thought of being alone in the streets by night.
At that inauspicious moment Mrs. Finley suddenly entered the room.
CHAPTER IX.
THE SECRET DIVULGED.
At the opening of the door, mother and daughter recoiled from each other with smothered cries of amazement.